E-News: Senior israel experience

January 8, 2016

27 Tevet, 5776 This Week at Rochelle Zell Senior Israel Experience Exam Schedule New Student Drivers' Ed STEM Corner From the P.O. Alumni in the News A Taste of Torah

Senior Israel Experience With Love From Kibbutz Keturah

Class Schedule ​Monday, January 18 No School Tuesday, January 19 B Wednesday, January 20 A

Where can you go to charge your iPhone via biodegradable cow pa6es and do peah on the corners of your field of solar panels by dona:ng profits to tzedakah? The senior class hit the desert in the south of Israel to learn about environmental awareness and sustainable living on Kibbutz Keturah before heading up to Jerusalem for a well-­‐earned Shabbat rest.

Thursday, January 21 C Friday, January 22 BB

Quick Links RZJHS.org Calendars Lunch Menu Edline Give Now

Save The Date January 3 -­‐ January 22 Senior Israel Experience

With the desert spread out in front of them, it was easy for our students to see themselves as specks in the greater sands of history-­‐-­‐or go dune-­‐jumping in lighter moments of playfulness!

The seniors are hiking, medita:ng, doing art projects and ropes courses, and ge6ng to know their teenage counterparts in Kiryat Gat. Check out the class blog for video narra:ves of their adventures! READ MORE >>

January 11 -­‐ January 15 Final Exams January 18 No School -­‐ MLK Jr. Day January 19 Semester 2 Begins Academic Planning Mee:ng for Sophomores and Parents January 24 JNF Tu Bishvat Fair January 25 Classes Resume for Seniors Senior Parent Mee:ng Tu Bishvat January 27 Junior Parent Mee:ng February 7 ACT at RZJHS

Exam Schedule Week of January 11 -­‐ 15

​February 15 No School -­‐ President's Day February 17-­‐21 Girls' Basketball Shabbaton and Tournament in Miami March 2-­‐6 Model UN Conference March 18-­‐19 All School Shabbaton ​March 18 2:15 p.m. Friday Dismissal Begins The Shalom bus will pick up riders at Braeside at 8:36 a.m. for the 9:30 a.m. exam. There will be three acernoon buses on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday: 12:10 p.m. pick up at RZJHS to meet the 12:39 p.m. return train to Chicago 2:10 p.m. pick up at RZJHS to meet the 2:39 p.m. train to Chicago 3:10 p.m. pick up at RZJHS to meet the 3:40 p.m. train to Chicago ​Remember to bring a brown bag lunch if you are staying for an acernoon test! Happy studying, everyone!

Welcome, Sam! New Junior Arrives at Rochelle Zell As second semester advances towards us, we are delighted to welcome Sam Shoshani to the eleventh grade class at Rochelle Zell Jewish High School. Baruch ha-­‐ba, Sam! We're glad to have you on board!

Drivers Ed Attention Freshmen and Sophomores Please remember to sign your student up for Drivers Ed for the Spring Semester. Adams School of Driving will be holding classes at Rochelle Zell Jewish High School beginning on Thursday, January

21, 2016 from 4:10 p.m. to 5:10 p.m. and on select dates. In order to enroll in these classes your student must have been born on or before May 16, 2001. Links for the forms can be found on the email you should have received on December 11th from Mr. Scher. If you have any ques:ons regarding the classes, please call Adams School of Driving at 847.965.6565 or email Janice Dlag at jdlag@rzjhs.org.

Alumni Trivia The Midwest and east coast may be slogging through rain and snow, and sleet, but some of our alumni have lec that problem behind! Which of our basketball-­‐playing student athletes is now wake-­‐boarding in sunny Florida on a presiden:al scholarship? He's not studying physics or football, but business!

STEM Corner Opportunities for the New Year Look and see what's in the community in 2016! The Argonne Out Loud lecture series is coming up this month, the BioGENEius program is accep:ng applica:ons, as is the annual Illinois video contest about Radon and the Interna:onal Summer Science Ins:tute at the Weizmann Ins:tute of Science in Israel. More science and technology research opportuni:es can be found on the Rochelle Zell STEM page! READ MORE >>

From the Parent Organization Save the Dates: Monday, February 22: Rochelle Zell P.O. movie night Saturday evening, March 12: Rochelle Zell Parent and Alumni Parent Event Tuesday, April 5: an evening with Mia Adler Ozair, author of Cook, Pray, Eat Kosher

Sponsored Breakfast

Happy birthday, Sol and Bea Triester! Thank you to the Triester family for sponsoring breakfast. If you would like to sponsor breakfast in honor of your favorite Tiger, contact Diane Zidman at dzidman@rzjhs.org.

Community News and Events

Students in the News Diller Fellows Graduate Congratula:ons to current Rochelle Zell junior Henry Wolle and to former Rochelle Zell students Lizzie Janssen and Barbara Sodos on comple:ng their Diller fellowships. The 15-­‐month fellowship provides teens with opportuni:es to explore topics of leadership, Jewish iden:ty, Israel and Tikkun Olam. At the gradua:on ceremony, the fellows presented their Alumni Impact Projects, which will enable them to con:nue their work to affect a posi:ve change in the Chicago area. To learn more about Diller Teen Fellows in Chicago, click here.

Alumni Trivia Yarden Michael ('14) is a sophomore at the University of Miami, where he is double majoring in accoun:ng and finance. Yarden is concentra:ng in real estate and business management, to which end he has spent the past two years interning at Cedar Street proper:es here in Chicago. In addi:on to his events at the University of Miami wake-­‐boarding club, Yarden is also an ac:ve member of the campus animal rights group, Students Helping Animals Society, and a lifeguard. Good for you, Yarden!

A Taste of Torah: Vaera ...‫ דִּ בֶּר ה‬,‫ כַּאֲ שֶׁ ר‬:‫ ו ְֹלא שָׁ מַ ע אֲ ֵלהֶ ם‬,‫לִבּוֹ‬-‫ ו ְהַ ְכבֵּד אֶ ת‬,‫ כִּי הָ י ְתָ ה הָ ְרו ָחָ ה‬,‫וַיּ ְַרא פַּ ְרע ֹה‬.

"When Pharaoh saw that there was a respite, he hardened his heart and did not listen to them, just as God had predicted."

-­‐-­‐ Parashat Vaera (Exodus 8:11, 15, 28) "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over but expec:ng different outcomes."

-­‐-­‐ Popular aphorism mistakenly a9ributed to Albert Einstein God smites the mighty land of Egypt with plague acer plague, each one crowned with an opportunity to bring an end to the catastrophe. The Pharaoh, against the advice of his magicians, his counselors, and his people, forcefully maintains that doing nothing is the only solu:on. Only wai:ng, he insists, will cause the plague naturally to come to an end, and allow Egypt and himself to survive the plague with dignity and tradi:onal values intact. Within his royal rooms, his solu:on works: he can drink wine while the less fortunate waste away for lack of water, and he can wait out the lice with royal fly-­‐whisks and an:sep:c kohl powders while his people scratch themselves to distrac:on. That his country is being destroyed and innocent people are losing their lives is regregable, but not a cause for ac:on. Pharaoh will acknowledge nothing that needs a change, nothing that is important enough to inconvenience his royal self or curb him from pu6ng his personal will into ac:on.

It is easy to point the finger of blame at the Pharaoh for his inac:on and his hard heart. He had two prophets at his feet telling him the word of God. When a plague swept his land, he had a clear and present solu:on in front of him: let the Israelite slaves go and worship their God. Would it have been easy? Certainly not! The labor force would have been smigen and the na:onal projects temporarily halted. To preserve his dignity, he might have needed to call on the natural xenophobia of his people to dull the frustra:on when the truant slaves failed to return-­‐-­‐good riddance to the Hebrew rubbish! Let the Egyp:an Empire rise without them! But with one sweeping move, Pharaoh could have ended all the plagues once and for all. He could have acknowledged a God and a Truth higher than his own rights, and willingly curbed his own will to save his people from disaster. He had in his hand a divine assurance: he need only let the people go, and the plague would vanish. What did he do? Nothing. One plague followed another un:l his own son lay dead before him, a casualty of his venera:on of the status quo.

If only our country's plagues were but ten in number! Our solu:on will never be as clear cut. We live in a :me of hester panim: God will send no prophet to assure us of success, and one single order, however wrong or right, will not prevent every single catastrophe from hereon out. No single solu:on will ever fully rid our land of the plague of violence that is sweeping the na:on.

Nothing will bring back the children of Sandy Hook, the office workers in San Bernadino, or the students in Oregon. However, this does not absolve us of our moral impera:ve to learn from Pharaoh's mistake. We must not do nothing.

In the end, God hardens Pharaoh's heart, and he isolates himself in his ivory pyramid, deaf to the suffering of his closest friends and aware of nothing but his own will. Let us not suffer the same fate! We lec Egypt three thousand years ago: we must not now harden out hearts towards each other. As we read the story of the Exodus this winter, let us open our hearts to our fellow ci:zens: Republican and Democrat, urban and suburban, staunch defenders of the status quo and anarchists for change. Let us seek solu:ons together instead of bickering and naysaying: if a solu:on seems faulty, let us work together to improve it. Above all, let us not do as Pharaoh did.

Let us not do nothing.

Ms. Shira Eliaser

1095 Lake Cook Road Deerfield, IL 60015 | rzjhstigers@rzjhs.org | 847.470.6700