Yaakov Hawk: the local do-gooder

The recent and growing SAT cheating investigation by the Nassau County District Attorney, resulting in the arrests of several local high school students, has dominated the news and should be reason for society to take a collective pause. It should also be the impetus for us to redefine how we define and measure success. Within the affiliated Jewish community, shared values in the commitment to chesed is evidence that we already ‘get it.’ Sometime we need a reminder, embodied by Yaakov Hawk, 16, a junior at DRS High School with a huge list of causes to support.

Hawk is the founder of Philanthropy for the Future, an initiative that combines chesed with fundraising. In its second year, the group encourages youths to volunteer, and take up social action.

A natural leader, Yaakov mobilized upwards of 50 fellow students to participate in last week’s Mission to Masbia in Brooklyn on Thanksgiving. Closer to home, Hawk founded the “Bowling Buddies” program, where participants team up with special needs children on long Friday afternoons of spring. The bowling program, which is hosted at Woodmere Lanes, accommodates 15 special needs youths, ages 5 through 20, and 10 volunteers, providing parents with respite.

Past campaigns promoted by Hawk have included selling bracelets to raise funds for the Susan G. Komen foundation for breat cancer research, and the Sharsheret Purim candy drive to benefit the Fogel family in Israel, letter writing to Israeli soldiers, and a Beaver Lake blood drive.

The eldest in a family of six children, Hawk credits his chesed commitment to his maternal great great grandparents, who by choice held the wedding meal for their daughter’s wedding at a Soup kitchen in Budapest, Hungary in the 1930s.

Hawk’s smile widens as he describes his great grandmother, Hedy Mayer, 86, of Borough Park. “She’s worldly, gives great advice and she’s the only grandmother who texts and uses Skype.” The legacy of chesed continues through the family’s business, Jaclyn Wigs, which routinely provides their product to financially strapped brides and to Chai Lifeline recipients.

A native of Passaic, and a former resident of West Hempstead, Hawk and his family have moved to Woodmere eight months ago. Hawk traces his first involvement with chesed activities to his kindergarten years when he collected money that he earmarked for bullet proof buses in Hebron. In second grade, he accepted donations for Hatzolah in lieu of birthday gifts. Within the last two years, under his leadership, Philantropy for the Future collected money to provide Chanukah gifts for his sister’s friend who had recently lost a parent, as well as Haiti earthquake relief fund.

On top of all this, Hawk is the Editor in Chief of the school newspaper, Vice President of his student government, an avid Devils hockey fan, (he is adamant about Martin Brodeur being the best goalie ever), enrolled in three AP courses, and writes poetry. When asked how he has time to do so much volunteering, Yaakov responds in just two seconds. “I just have to do this.”