‘Miracles’ on Grand Central Parkway Yeshiva Har Torah celebrates growth and expansion at its Annual Dinner By SHARYN PERLMAN hen the 540 students at Yeshiva Har Torah (YHT) returned to school from their winter recess on Monday, Jan. 30, they couldn’t believe that their school had a brand new, 16,000square-foot third floor. That’s because the school’s 9-month expansion project was completed in a way that not only didn’t impinge on their daily routine, it was done almost stealthily. The shell of the third floor — which now has 12 new classrooms
and is home for the fifth through eighth graders — was completed last summer. When school started after Labor Day, the construction workers entered the school by climbing up the outdoor scaffolding and going through the roof in order to build the inside of the third floor. The workers never saw the students and the students never saw the workers. “The kids were stunned when they came back from vacation and saw this completed third floor, because they had never seen any workers,” explains Alan Steinberg, YHT director of development, who was responsible for both raising the $3 million
school “its diversity” by attracting students from 14 different communities — from Forest Hills in the west to Plainview in the east, and from Great Neck on the North Shore to Atlantic Beach on the South Shore. Two years ago, just a few years after the new building opened, the
from having more students has enabled YHT to offer students more during a time when the economy is challenged, according to Ed Fox, YHT executive director. Tuition starts at $8,800 in kindergarten and goes up to $11,500 in eighth grade. “Our tuition assistance has doubled, both
In spite of the economy, the school has grown and the increased revenue from having more students has enabled YHT to offer students more during a time when the economy is challenged.
Photos courtesy Yeshiva Har Torah
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for the expansion as well as managing the project’s construction. Rabbi Gary Menchel, YHT principal, says that when the school opened the doors to its new building in September 2005, enrollment was at 350 students. The following year, the school added a third kindergarten,
and has added a class in each grade since; today there are three classes in each grade from kindergarten through fifth grade. Next year’s projection is 560 students, with the total enrollment expected to “max out” at 613 in three years, when K-8 will each have three classes. To serve the students, the school currently has more than 70 faculty members. Now in his 17th year at the helm of YHT, Menchel attributes the growth of the school to many things, not the least of which is its “outstanding location,” at the intersection of the Grand Central Parkway and Little Neck Parkway, which gives the
be the guests of honor at the dinner, which Fox says is expected to draw some 450 attendees. “The Kaylies are leading this, but our parents will follow” and help support the scholarship fund, says Fox, adding, “We’re on a mission and we don’t want to lose the kids just because their parents are having a hard time financially.” Gloria and Harvey Kaylie, founder and president of Mini Circuits and honorary building chairman of the expansion project, are planning to dedicate the new third floor in honor of building chairman Alan Steinberg.
(Left): Pictured at the dedication of the second floor of the Yeshiva Har Torah new building are (l-r): YHT student Sophie Kule, great-granddaughter of Stanley and Raine Silverstein, who dedicated the second floor; Alan Steinberg, YHT director of development; Stanley Silverstein; Leslie Kule; Raine Silverstein; YHT student Oscar Kule, great-grandson of the Silversteins; and YHT Principal Rabbi Gary Menchel. (Right): YHT President Yossie Sprigel (left) affixes a mezuzah to the new teacher’s lounge on the third floor as Menchel (c) and Steinberg watch. (Below, left): Harvey Kaylie, honorary building chairman, in front of YHT. (Below, center): Benefactors Harvey and Gloria Kaylie. (Below, right): Steinberg inspects the third-floor construction.
school was bursting at its seams. The expansion was not optional, according to Yossie Sprigel, a banker and YHT parent who has volunteered as the school’s president for the past three years. “Despite the economy we kept attracting families. We maxed out the space in the new building and it was too stressful to have so many kids in the building the way it was. So we knew we needed to do the expansion, and we’ve been very fortunate because people who believe in our mission have helped us carry out our mission even during the recession.” In spite of the economy, the school has grown and the increased revenue
the amount of money we’ve given out and the number of families who have to ask. They say the economy is getting better, but we still have parents who have lost their jobs. We gave out $750,000 in scholarships this year,” says Fox.
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his Saturday evening, YHT will celebrate its 23rd anniversary with an Annual Dinner and will inaugurate the Tess Kaylie Scholarship Fund, in tribute to Tess Kaylie on her first yahrzeit. Tess Kaylie’s son and daughter-in-law, Harvey and Gloria Kaylie, who have eight grandchildren — one who is a YHT student — will
Kaylie chose his dedication because, “Alan is a dynamo who was able to not only get the job done according to the timeline, which is almost unheard of, but he also got it done under budget even while he was raising all the money.” Over the past two years, to accommodate the additional students, sixth, seventh and eighth graders were in “makeshift” classrooms; the library was transformed into four classrooms and the beit midrash, science lab and computer lab also became classrooms. Now that the third floor is in use, the “makeshift” classrooms have been dismantled and are being returned to their original functions. On a tour of the school, including the new third floor, Steinberg, a YHT parent who is currently taking off a second year from his commercial real estate business to serve as the school’s director of development, says that the “third floor looks as if it was added seamlessly” because they used the same architect and construction company — Angelo Francis Corva and Kulka Construction, continued on page 10
‘Baruch Hashem, we have this building, and it’s great, but to me it’s a symbol of the accomplishment of the school. It’s a beautiful building but what happens in the building is where it really comes to life.’ —Rabbi Gary Menchel, principal 8
JEWISH TRIBUNE • FEB. 24-MAR. 1, 2012
Gloria and Harvey Kaylie: Dedicated benefactors arvey and Gloria Kaylie, Yeshiva Har Torah (YHT) grandparents, have a soft spot for people with special needs, especially children. “When I learned that YHT has special considerations for children with special needs, who need special tutoring or have other special needs, I was very impressed,” says Harvey Kaylie in a phone interview. He attended a board meeting and was “impressed” that members of the board “all contribute to the school.” He was also impressed when he visited the school and saw that the students, who are taught to respect their elders, “stood up when I entered the classroom.” Kaylie accepted the invitation to join the board and became active in the school; he has served as the honorary building chairman of the school’s third-floor expansion project. “Gloria and I feel that we are blessed to be part of the Har Torah community. Hashem has been good to us and we are able to help. This school will affect not only the lives of the students, but also the lives of the children of these
students. It’s an ongoing process that we’re blessed to be part of,” he says. The Kaylies, who have homes in Great Neck, the Hamptons and Boca Raton, will be the guests of honor at the YHT 23rd Annual Dinner this Saturday evening, Feb. 25. Special tribute will be paid to Harvey Kaylie’s mother, Tess, who died a year ago at the age of 100, on her first yahrzeit by creating the Tess Kaylie Scholarship Fund. Kaylie, the founder and president of Mini Circuits, which is based in Brooklyn and “has facilities all over the world,” describes his mother as “a simple woman, who never spoke lashon hara about anyone. My values come from my mother. She was dedicated to helping my youngest brother, Marvin, who is mentally retarded.” Tess Kaylie’s commitment to her
(Right): Harvey Kaylie (right), honorary building chairman, puts up the mezuzah with Rabbi Menchel. (Below, l-r): Camp Kaylie Director Rabbi Peretz Hochbaum, Gloria Kaylie, Harvey Kaylie and OHEL President Moishe Hellman at Camp Kaylie.
Photo courtesy OHEL
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One camper with special needs whispered to his friend, the lifeguard, ‘I have a secret to tell you. I have Down’s Syndrome, but nobody here knows!’
A construction project beset by plagues … and miracles
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o building construction is without its challenges, and the expansion of Yeshiva Har Torah (YHT) was no exception. The project was beset by “plagues,” and “miracles,” as YHT officials refer to them. Some of the “miracles” that occurred were financial in nature, including: • During the summer of 2009, during the students’ summer vacation and in the midst of a sagging economy, YHT had a “recession buster donor match” program. An anonymous donor offered to match all contributions made by the parent body dollar for dollar. There was only one “catch”: Without exception, every YHT family had to contribute, no matter how dire its financial straits, or the anonymous donor would not match the funds. The YHT office of development contacted every family, including those on scholarship and those away on summer vacation, and informed them of the matching donor opportunity. With every
Alan Steinberg, YHT director of development, recalls how construction workers were busy sanding the justpoured concrete (left) on Aug. 23 when the building started moving. They feared that the building was coming down, or else it was an earthquake. “Thank God it’s an earthquake!” they said.
family participating, the school raised $200,000 — the highest donation was $25,000; the lowest donation was $5. The anonymous donor matched that sum, for a total of $400,000 raised over the summer vacation. • In six months, from June 2011 through January 2012, the YHT community raised $3 million and completed the building of an additional 16,000-square-foot third floor. • An anonymous donor strikes again. In December 2011, YHT
parents who were in tuition arrears for the previous two years were informed that if they paid 50 percent of what they owed the school, an anonymous donor would match them dollar for dollar. The school would get the tuition it was due and the parents would have a zero balance, enabling them to feel both relieved and proud. The school raised nearly $120,000 in three weeks. But the strangest “miracle” occurred on Tuesday, Aug. 23.
Alan Steinberg, YHT director of development, who not only raised the funds for the expansion but was also the “project manager,” tells the story of that day. “We had a timeline for the project. And we knew, six months earlier, that we were going to pour the concrete at the end of August. Jack Kulka [of Kulka Construction] suggested that we do it all in one day, on Tuesday, Aug. 23. “We started very early in the morning, at 6 a.m., and we poured the entire 16,000 square feet. The cement was pumped up through the open windows and poured. We finished at approximately 2:00 in the afternoon. At which point the workers went up there continued on next page
‘In August we had floods, hail, an earthquake and a hurricane! It was like the plagues; Hashem was definitely watching over us.’ —Alan Steinberg, director of development
youngest son is echoed by Harvey Kaylie, who named the Marvin Kaylie Center on Kings Highway in Brooklyn for his brother, “so he should have some nachas. When it opened, he said, ‘That’s my name on the building!’ ” Kaylie also says that his mother “was the kind of woman who, if I achieved something, didn’t tell people about it because she didn’t want them to be jealous.” Kaylie himself, a self-made business mogul, is also reluctant to flaunt his success, and does his charitable works quietly. In addition to supporting YHT, he also shares his success with, among other organizations, the City University of New York (CUNY) and OHEL Children’s Home and Family Services, having established OHEL’s Camp Kaylie, a summer camp that seamlessly fuses together children with special needs and mainstream children so the former don’t feel “different.” Gloria Kaylie, who “feels for the caregivers” of people with special needs and “understands how hard it is for them,” explains that “the most important thing about Camp Kaylie is that it’s a good respite for the parents of children with special needs.” According to Mrs. Kaylie, Camp Kaylie also has plans to help “provide the parents of children with special needs a place to get away without the kids to have some free time in beautiful surroundings.” Harvey Kaylie explains that the 120-acre, “upscale camp, built around a beautiful lake, is a whole different concept. People with disabilities are at a disadvantage and sometimes people shy away from them and think they’re different. It’s not the most pleasant thing to be different because you have feelings too. So this camp puts everyone together in the same bunk and the person with special needs participates in the same activities without having to feel different,” he says. “I can only imagine how different my brother, Marvin’s life continued on next page
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Miracles continued from page 8 respectively — who worked on Phase One of the project, erecting the school’s new building. While Phase Two added the third floor, it was really “a fifth floor,” because the school has two floors below ground and three floors above; however, even the floors “below ground level” have natural light because of high windows near the ceiling. Steinberg, who was the capital campaign chairman for the new building from 2004-2006, says that the biggest challenge this time around “was raising the money during the recession. Six years ago, we had to raise $10 million, and it wasn’t easy, but it was easier. Now we had to raise less money — $3 million — but it was almost as much work because we
which the school has been eyeing. “We are in the process of gaining ownership, and hope to have that completed in the next few months,” says Fox, explaining that the land now belongs to the New York City Parks Department and will cost approximately $250,000. Plans for the land include making it “a parking lot as well as additional outdoor space for the children to be able to be outdoors part of the day,” he says, adding that there are also plans to create some recreational area on the roof. Sprigel, who has been involved in all phases of the school’s expansion, says that “after the land is acquired, that will be the completion of our physical growth.” Fox also says that YHT is “looking into the possibility of having a day care center in one of our classrooms. It’s a complicated process, with licensing issues and regulations that are quite complex. But it would be a
through third grade in one school, and fourth through eighth grade in another location, and when the kid entered fourth grade, he no longer had contact with his previous teachers. Now we have the ability to look at a specific child and see his or her growth over the years.” Feinberg says it’s also beneficial for the students to know that they’re
‘What makes me most proud is the product of the school, our graduates. They reflect the values of the school.’
Kids working the Web in the YHT computer lab, a former classroom during the construction.
had to raise it from a lot more people. We started the project in the middle of the recession, not because we wanted to, but because we had to. We borrowed some of the money, but we’re paying it off very quickly. The contractors have been paid, but we need additional funds to pay off the loan. “The upside of doing [the expansion] now is that during the recession, a lot of people were hungry for our business. So we got great deals on the jobs that we were buying out — the steel, the plumbing, etc. We saved probably close to 20 percent of our budget. And because we had the money, we were also able to get an extra 2-3 percent off for early payments,” Steinberg explains. Now that the expansion has been completed, what’s next for YHT? There is a parcel of land just east of the school on Little Neck Parkway,
Kaylie continued from previous page would have been if he had had something like this in his life. He’s 65 and lives in an OHEL Beis Ezra home” in Brooklyn, says Kaylie. He is most proud of the camp because it provides special needs campers with an experience where they feel they are part of everything without feeling different. To illustrate, Kaylie tells the story of how one of the camp’s lifeguards befriended a “special needs” camper. One day, the camper whispered to the lifeguard, “I 10
Drs. Miriam and Felix Glaubach, honorary building chairman for Phase One of the construction, with Menchel (right) and Steinberg (left), visiting the third floor after completion of Phase Two.
warm environment we have at the school and knowing each child individually.” Menchel says that he personally “works hard” at getting to know all 540 students by “interacting with them” and through “ongoing meetings with teachers to track each student’s progress.” Academically speaking, YHT mainstreams all its students, yet has different groupings for reading, math
choice (the majority of the graduates attend single-gender high schools). Though the school was founded as an Ashkenazi school, approximately 20-25 percent of the students come from Sephardi homes; Sephardi customs are taught and there is a Sephardi minyan one morning a week, led by one of the rebbes, who is Sephardi, but the minyan is not held on a Monday or Thursday
In the new building, ‘there’s more of a relationship between the older kids and the younger kids. The older kids feel the responsibility of a leadership role; they realize that the younger kids look up to them.’ tremendous service to provide to our in the same school building from younger teachers.” kindergarten through eighth grade, which also allows for big brother/big r. Karyn Feinberg, the YHT sister programs as well as a more school psychologist who has cohesive and unified interaction been with the school for 22 of its 23 among both students and faculty. Another important factor, says years, says that aside from the difference of physically having a new Feinberg, is that “there’s more of a building, the YHT family has relationship between the older kids changed because of its growth and and the younger kids. The older kids feel the responsibility of a leadership expansion. “What’s been different in the past role; they realize that the younger six years [since we moved into the kids look up to them.” Menchel agrees, but says that one new building] is the ability to have a more longitudinal perspective of the of the challenges of the new, larger children. Before, we had kindergarten school is “maintaining the nurturing
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have a secret to tell you. I have Down’s Syndrome, but nobody here knows!” The camper felt so much a part of the camp, says Kaylie, that he thought his disability was a secret. Camp Kaylie “levels the playing field for the kids with disabilities. They and the kids without disabilities come away from the summer experience with the feeling that they’ve learned a lot,” says Kaylie. “I’ve done a lot of charitable things in my life, and one of the greatest things Gloria and I have done is to be able to provide the means to create this camp.” For more information on Camp Kaylie, call 718.686.3261 or visit www.campkaylie.org. —Sharyn Perlman
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Plagues continued from previous page and started sanding the concrete to even it out. “[YHT Principal] Rabbi Menchel and I and a few teachers were in the building. About half an hour after they finished pouring the concrete, the building started moving. We were very frightened. We couldn’t explain it, except that perhaps the concrete was giving the building an overburden because we had also just put on 195 tons of steel, and with all the concrete, who knows, the engineers could have been off. We thought the building was coming down.
and Hebrew language in order “to meet the needs and different challenges of different kids,” explains Menchel. And when necessary, individual students are “pulled out” for occupational therapy, physical therapy and individualized speech and language instruction. YHT is completely coed through fourth grade; fifth through eighth grades are separated for Jewish studies, but coed for general studies. Menchel says emphatically that there are “no thoughts of starting a high school” because YHT graduates are accepted to the high schools of their
because the school doesn’t have a Sephardi Torah. According to Menchel, with the exception of Talmud, all Jewish studies are taught Ivrit b’Ivrit, with instruction in Hebrew, even though finding qualified teachers who are fluent Hebrew speakers is “very difficult.” Now that the expansion is complete, Menchel, who provides the spiritual guidance for the school, sums it up: “Baruch Hashem, we have this building, and it’s great, but to me it’s a symbol of the accomplishment of the school. The building is the form, but it also reflects the
“We immediately ordered everyone to evacuate the building. Even the contractors saw the flags waving without wind inside the building. As we were running outside Rabbi Menchel yelled, ‘It’s either an earthquake or the building’s coming down.’ We looked at each other and said, ‘When was the last time we had an earthquake here in Queens?’ “So we ran outside into the parking lot, and I called our neighbor [in the building next door] who said, ‘We also thought it was your building coming down, but then we heard that there was an earthquake in Virginia and we were getting some of that too.’ We looked at each other and said, ‘Thank God it’s an earthquake.’ Who would
ever thank God for an earthquake? [laughs] “And that earthquake had been preceded two weeks earlier by heavy rains and flooding. Three weeks before we had a huge hailstorm. We hadn’t recovered from the earthquake and three days later, the windows weren’t even secure yet and we had to batten down the hatches because we were getting a hurricane. So in August we had floods, hail, an earthquake and a hurricane! It was like the plagues; Hashem was definitely watching over us. “The building did get some interior damage, but we cleaned it up and the kids were able to start school, on time, right after Labor Day!” —Sharyn Perlman
tochen, the content of the school. It’s a beautiful building but what happens in the building is where it really comes to life. “What makes me most proud is the product of the school, our graduates. They reflect the values of the school, the Torah, the chesed, middot, and their commitment to Medinat Yisrael, to contributing to society; they’re a tribute to the school. “I think that is the key to the success of Yeshiva Har Torah. We work very hard at creating an environment of respect here. It makes the students respectful — of one another, of teachers, of parents. The middot, the character development, is as important, if not more important, than the learning that takes place.” The Yeshiva Har Torah 23rd Annual Dinner will take place on Saturday evening, Feb. 25, 8:15 p.m., at Terrace on the Park. The dinner will honor the memory of Tess Kaylie on the occasion of her first yahrzeit. Harvey and Gloria Kaylie will be the guests of honor. For more information or to make a reservation, contact Ed Fox, executive director, at 718.343.2533, ext. 2411, email efox@hartorah.org, or visit www.hartorah.org.
YHT students not ‘locked out’
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hile Yeshiva Har Torah (YHT) was building its third floor extension, which is now home to the middle school students, various building contractors, architects, engineers and vendors visited the school, vying for its business. One such visitor — a woman accompanied by two male associates — represented a company that manufactures and sells student lockers. They met with school officials to introduce their company and see the existing lockers on the second floor so they would be able to match them as much as closely as possible. Their intention was to obtain the order for the new lockers that were to be installed on the new third floor. After viewing the lockers on the second floor, they said, “No problem, we can get these lockers for you and our lockers will match very nicely.” However, they commented on something they noticed, which
YHT’s lock-less lockers, while unusual, represent the values-based education the school provides, because “stealing is just not acceptable or tolerated; therefore, why would our lockers need locks?”
they thought was very unusual — not one YHT locker had an actual lock on it. The YHT officials looked at them quizzically and said, “Our students don’t use locks on their lockers because we teach them that ‘Thou shalt not steal’ is one of our treasured 10 Commandments. And
we want to foster trust within our students.” The locker salespeople looked at the YHT officials dumbfounded. It was explained to the “locker people” that the school teaches a values-based education, and that “stealing is just not acceptable or tolerated; therefore, why would our
lockers need locks?” The locker people, who have been selling school lockers for many years, were at first hesitant, but then agreed that the school’s “no lock on lockers” policy was the “most beautiful and sensible” thing they have ever heard of in any school they have ever visited. In the end, they got the order for the 250 new lockers. YHT school officials agreed tongue-in-cheek that perhaps the place where the students keep their books and personal belongings should not be called “lockers,” but something else. They are open to suggestions. —Sharyn Perlman
“Our students don’t use locks on their lockers because we teach them that ‘Thou shalt not steal’ and we want to foster trust within our students.”
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