OUR COMMUNITY ON CAMPUS
ABOUT US
Kedma is the Orthodox Jewish community at the University of Maryland. Aside from being one of the largest orthodox college communities (300-500 members), we pride ourselves on being warm, open, diverse, and vibrant. One of our biggest advantages is that we have members from all over the country and a large majority of us live on campus, enabling an immersive Jewish environment all throughout the week. In addition to unparalleled religious programming and learning opportunities, we also have social events throughout the year, like dodgeball and basketball tournaments, and charity marathons. Please email us with any questions, we'd love to hear from you!
HISTORY
Around 1996, UMD already had three daily minyanim, but just barely, and around 100-120 people would show up for the Shabbat evening meal at Hillel. In an effort to grow the observant community, several students began hosting prospective student Shabbatonim and presented the community as being larger than it actually was. Whether you call it a lie or a self-fulfilling prophecy, the venture was successful, and the community started on the upswing in the late 1990s. And thus, around the beginning of 1997, Kedma was founded, originally under the name OJAM (Orthodox Jews At Maryland). Within a semester, this was replaced with the current name, Kedma, in order to complete the trifecta with Koach and Kesher (now known as Neshama and Ruach, the Conservative and Reform student groups). Kedma's first major events were Purim and Simchat Torah 1997. Later in 2004, Kedma saw the arrival of Maryland's first JLIC couple, the Fischers, as well as the completion of the campus eruv. Kedma essentially doubled in size in the late 2000s, and has only kept growing since. Today we are proud of our history and can't wait to welcome you to our wonderful community.
DOCUMENTS
VIEW THE ARCHIVES
To view past Kedma emails going back to 2007, first join the email list if you're not on it already. Then, go to the Kedma listserv site and click "get a new LISTSERV password" if you haven't logged in before. Once you've logged in, you should see a list of months. Click on them to see the emails sent out that month. Note: emails that consist of images instead of text may not display correctly. To view these, you have to click on the attached images individually, listed above the email.
Orthodox Jewish Community at University of Maryland