"A $1.5 million gift from alumnus Jack Kay will establish the Abraham S. and Jack Kay Chair in Israel Studies at the University of Maryland - the next critical piece in the development of an unusual integrative approach to teaching Middle East studies. The gift will be used to hire a historian of 19th and 20th century Israeli history to serve jointly in the new Joseph and Alma Gildenhorn Institute for Israel Studies, the Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies and the department of history. "There's a major trend on U.S. campuses to expand Israel studies and to create endowed chairs in the field, and we're in the forefront - but we're going about it differently here," says Hayim Lapin, director of Maryland's Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies."