Three palettes of kosher meat hauled from Miami, 1,500 rolls of challah loaded up in the rabbi's minivan and hundreds of volunteers are all part of the Chabad UF Jewish Student Center’s preparation heading into the Jewish high holidays. And this year, Chabad leaders say they expect its highest turnout ever.
Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, begins on Monday, followed by 10 days of repentance that end with Yom Kippur. Chabad UF is kicking celebrations off with its Gators Stay Sweet event at the O’Connell Center that night, which will include service, the blowing of the shofar and dinner.
More than 1,500 students are expected to attend — 200 more than last year, according to Rabbi Meyer Brook, who is in charge of event logistics for Chabad.
Shlomo Sufrin, president of programming of the Lubavitch Chabad Student Group, said he enjoys seeing the strong turnout.
“It really shows home how strong the community is,” he said.
High event attendance stems from UF being the highest-populated Jewish student public university in the U.S., Sufrin added.
“Having a lot of Jewish students just gives more opportunity for things for us to do,” he said. “We get a lot of people on a constant basis because of that."
Attendance at Chabad UF’s events has been on the rise, according to Brook. He said the center’s first Shabbat dinner service of the semester hosted about 700 students, breaking a 25-year record.
"It's even hard to put it into words how incredible we feel," Brook said. "It was a great feeling, we were all so happy."
Preparing for such large events puts Chabad UF’s staff under a lot of pressure, forcing them to plan early. Brook said he and his team started setting the menu and discussing the logistics a month in advance. They then started cooking six days before the first night of Rosh Hashanah.
Due to a lack of kosher produce in the area, Chabad UF staff spent the majority of their time sourcing the kosher food they had to import from Miami. For the first night of Rosh Hashanah alone, Brook said they ordered 1,500 apples, 1,500 rolls of challah bread, 120 pans of brisket, 100 pans of rice and 200 pans of vegetables.
Overall, he said Chabad UF has spent between $100,000 and $120,000 to run their events between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
Rabbi Menachen Mendel Goldman, who focuses on Chabad UF's finances, said it took 15 volunteers to unload the three pallets of Kosher meat that came in at 1:30 a.m. on Sept. 13. Additionally, he said, the center is renting a third freezer to accommodate approximately 2,500 individual meals’ worth of food.
"It's a big Herculean effort," he said.
Another obstacle Chabad UF has to overcome with these large events is finding the funds to host so many students. Because there is no membership fee, and students can come to events free of charge, Chabad UF's only source of funding is donations.
Goldman said most donors are parents or alumni. They don't attend the events and sometimes don’t understand how much Chabad UF needs to keep running its programs.
"Sometimes it gets very hairy and tough," he said. "Trying to convey that message … to keep the lights on is the biggest difficulty."
After the Gators Stay Sweet event, Chabad UF has many events for the rest of the high holidays.
For the second day of Rosh Hashanah, Chabad UF will have services starting at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, followed by dinner at their facilities on 2021 NW Fifth Ave at 8 p.m. To finish off the holiday, they will have services at 10 a.m. on Wednesday and then closing services at 7:58 p.m.
On Friday, Chabad UF will have its weekly Shabbat service and dinner at its center. For Yom Kippur, they will have services at 6:57 p.m. on Oct. 1. For Oct. 2, services start at 10 a.m., heading into the night and break fast at 7:50 p.m.
Despite the chaos ahead for Chabad UF staff, they look forward to providing a home to the Jewish students on campus.
"There's nothing that we wouldn't do to make sure that they're comfortable and happy and have a good holiday experience," Brook said.
Contact Jeffrey Serber at Jserber@alligator.org. Follow him on X @JeffreySerber.
Jeffrey is the Fall 2025 enterprise and men's basketball beat reporter and a second-year journalism sports & media major. In his free time, he enjoys hanging out with friends and family, and rooting for the Miami sports teams.
