Dr. Paul D. Schneider

Pirkei Avot asks us, “Who is wise?” The answer is, “He who learns from everyone.” In order to maximize our learning, we are urged to take advantage of every resource available to us.

The new KSDS Science Enrichment Committee was given the task of proposing a program that would take advantage of the vast resources in our own community in the area of science. Do you know how many of our KSDS parents and grandparents, and how many of our alumni work in science-related fields? Dozens and dozens work in medicine, engineering, computer technology, and science education and research. Continue reading »

Rabbi Micah Liben

Rava sent a gift to the local governor, Bar Sheshach, on one of the pagan feast days. He went to pay a visit, and found Bar Sheshach sitting up to his neck in rosewater petals, with harlots standing before him. Bar Sheshach said to him: “Do you have anything as pleasing as this in your world to come?” Rava replied: “We have something better than this!” Bar-Sheshach said: “What could be better than this?” And Rava said to him . . . (BT Masechet Avodah Zarah 65a)

We pride ourselves on graduating students with a superlative “how-to” skill set to put in their proverbial toolbox – our students demonstrate comfort as well as leadership on the bimah by reading Torah, leading services, and serving as gabbaim; they exhibit strong public speaking skills by putting on presentations and even plays in Hebrew; they are able to open up a Hebrew Humash, identify the parasha, and decipher the Rashi script. But when it comes to the “why” of Jewish practice, do we adequately make the case for Jewish living? Continue reading »

Tom Elieff

It’s an oft-heard subject of complaint among those of us who work in American K-12 schools, in both Jewish day schools and non-sectarian private schools: that beast we call today’s parent. So many are consumeristic, accusatory, hard to please. Is there any room for really promoting core Judaic values? Forget it. School is not about developing humanistic values; it’s about where you go next—to the most highly selective college [or middle or upper school, whichever is next up]. And school is not about what curriculum is published on the website or what you read about in the teacher’s weekly newsletter; it’s about vying to get what you really want—that unique, exclusive curriculum created singularly for your child alone. And if your kid is experiencing social scrapes? No prob—you can always play the bully card and spend the year harassing the teachers and administrators. Continue reading »

Bill Cohen

Having recently returned from the outstanding North American Jewish Day School Conference in Atlanta, a number of ideas and thoughts have crystallized in ways that they had not previously. Here are some foundational thoughts: There are a number of Schechter Schools who are oversubscribed, and who maintain waiting lists. Those schools are limited by location or space, and cannot expand. One challenge for these schools is to “select” the best recruits for their long-term sustainability. However, these school are the vast minority of Jewish Day Schools in North America. For a majority of us, growing our schools by increasing new student enrollment combined with better returning student retention is the key to the future. Yes, like you, I spend a lot of my time doing fundraising (both annual campaign and major gifts), Board of Trustees partnership and committee work, and managing our administrative team. But, in the end of the day, I am convinced that growing our school is the key issue to be addressed over the next five years. Continue reading »

Rabbi Ellen Bernhardt

Most of us have heard the expression, “A pintele Yid,” literally means the dot of a Jew. What it really means is that there’s a spark of Jewishness inside. I find that working with parents, I need to find that pintele and ignite it. I want to ignite it so that they may feel the passion of being Jewish as I do. I’ve taught many classes to parents in which we go on a (metaphorical) journey to uncover long-lost positive feelings of Jewishness from childhood. Reclaiming the childhood memories is sometimes painful, but usually leads to self-disclosure about how that part of themselves got closed off later in life for a specific reason.

“I hated my Hebrew school teacher.” “My parents stopped talking to me because I was dating a non-Jew.” “I experienced anti-Semitism in college,” and so on. But now Continue reading »

Rabbi Shira Leibowitz

They visit on my facebook newsfeed – playful, thoughtful, thriving – middle and high school friends with whom I have little contact beyond their status updates, but who were once an integral part of my daily life. While I have not reconnected with my teachers, I still often think of them and of my principal, Mr. S. Hirsch Jacobson (May His Memory Be a Blessing). They guided and nurtured me through my adolescent years, ultimately serving as role models for the career I would later embrace. In tribute to them, I choose to write this post not primarily in my capacity as a rabbi, a Ph.D. in Jewish education, or even as Lower School Principal of Schechter Westchester, but rather as a graduate of a Schechter Day School – shaped by an exemplary education for which I am profoundly grateful. Continue reading »

Rabbi Fred Elias

Next Monday is our semi-annual Faculty Development Day at the Solomon Schechter Day School of Bergen County. Like many schools, these days begin appropriately so with tefillah (a prayer service). For the past couple of years, we have increasingly examined the value of having the entire community together to begin our day. Whether it is for ideological reasons of belonging to a different faith or those who pray in a different ideological setting (i.e. where men and women sit separately) from ours, some of our faculty has felt disconnected to the community by the school’s compulsion on faculty days to attend a mandatory Conservative Jewish prayer service. Continue reading »

Sally Baer

I would like to share with you parts of an article I wrote in September for our weekly school communication, The Shabbat Shofar. The article, entitled Being Bullies; Being Bullied was intended to offer parents and students concrete responses for dealing with bullying issues while cautioning against use of the bullying label too often.

Among the many values we work to instill in our children are those of kindness, respect, honesty, and a sense of responsibility. As Jewish educators and as parents, we know the value of modeling character traits that we want to build in our children. We talk about ways to exhibit these values, and we offer guidance and advice when our children are faced with difficult situations. Continue reading »

Arnie Zar-Kessler

I’ve been writing a series of columns on key directions our school is embarking upon to further integrate technology into the educational program, and into the operations of the school. In this column, my second in the series, I had intended to focus on what educational research tells us about the impact of technology on student learning. More specifically, I intended to share the results of research on what the advent of computers in schools and classrooms has on student outcomes, on various measures, including but not limited to, standardized test scores and other established measures of improved student performance. Continue reading »

Rabbi Laurence Scheindlin

Here are some claims I have heard about the arts and the evidence of neuroscience: Music training improves children’s ability to read. The performing arts improve creativity. Visual arts training correlates with children’s enhanced ability to do math calculations. Dance training improves “executive function” (organizing, planning, etc.).

Some of these studies might turn out to be right and others wrong. What bothers me is the assumption behind the superficial news reports surrounding them. They purport that the arts are important only if they make people “smarter” in the way we usually think of intelligence. Continue reading »