Anti-niche is a word that I came up with to describe the Yeshiva when people were asking me ‘what is the niche of the yeshiva?’. Most yeshivas, as businesses, have a niche that they cater to and that they do very well with. Typically, in Post high school programs, as their name suggests, they cater to a certain demographic - certain boys that are between 18 and 20 years old, from a certain background, certain religious hashkafa that they have, and they all go to that place. So too a Kollel. Usually, Kollels for certain boys that are certain ages, young, married men for a certain age. And the demographics become more and more narrow as the niche becomes more specific and there's tremendous benefit to such a program. As in businesses, the more you have a niche that you do one thing very well, you tend to make very good profits and that product is very good.  

And when you start branching out into other realms, the business may not be as high quality with product that that business may not be such high quality. And the same thing happens to Yeshivas. For example, you have baal teshuva yeshivas that focus on their niche, and it even becomes more and more narrow and defined. And I'm not saying anything against them. But this yeshiva is something different. That's where I came up with the anti-niche idea. We actually want people who are not in one demographic group. We want many different demographic groups represented, as much as possible, to bring a healthy balance to people because the niche, even though in business it's very powerful, in Torah, in ahavas Yisrael, the narrower the niche is, the less they understand and can relate to the other niches that are out there in the Jewish world. And that is a big loss.  

And the yeshiva world, for the most part, is not fostering that. It comes out when people from a certain demographic, British boys and South African boys cannot get along because they go to one yeshiva, they go to another yeshiva and the Americans and go to another, and American Israelis go to yet another yeshiva, and everything becomes very polarized. And when they do finally interact it is usually with difficulty, cultural difficulties and gaps.  

In the yeshiva, what we tried to do Is to bring all these groups together to as much as possible, and when those conflicts arise, to actually teach the bochurim, avreichim, or baal habatim to work together to try to get past that conflict and try to understand each other and not be afraid of each other. That's where the anti-niche came from.  

And it extends beyond hashkafas and age groups to also include businessmen, a baal habas in a regular yeshiva doesn't fit. What is he doing here? He needs to go to his place, where they have a morning Kollel, where they have a Daf Yomi or whatever their programming is. Which is good. But it's a whole different experience when a professional baal habas, a lawyer, a doctor, comes and leaves his job for whatever period of time and spends time in the yeshiva with the bochur. The 20-year-old bochur is now the rebbi. He's with him, and each one gains from the other. All of a sudden the bochur is now responsible; he's not just a kid anymore. He’s going to be giving over something to the professional who comes in. And the professional in the same right - he has left his home, left his wife, left his job and he's coming to learn in Israel for a week or two, whatever he has, and that gives us seriousness to the chavrusaship that an 18-year-old with another 18-year-old can't experience in a normal framework.  

That's what the anti-niche is, and we've seen incredible beracha from such an anti-niche where people are learning from different groups that they would never have exposure to in a normal environment and that is something that lasts for them throughout their lives.