OCTOBER 2018
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Weeden Park gets a makeover
Teaching teachers
Kickin’ in the rain
Grant provides STEM education for district K-5 educators
Works of art will call Main Street space home
By scoTT MorGaN
By FraNk coMsTock Central Jersey’s fascination with sculpture is coming to Lawrence in a big way in the next few months. The large grassy area at the back of Weeden Park on Main Street in Lawrence will be transformed into a pop-up sculpture park with the installation of about a dozen sculptures crafted in various materials. Local residents and members of the Board of Directors of Lawrenceville Main Street worked with creators from the Artists of the Motor Exhibit Building to bring the concept to fruition. The artists, working at the repurposed Motor Exhibit Building, once part of the Trenton State Fairgrounds, at Grounds for Sculpture were excited at the prospect, visiting the site to look at the possibility of installing one or two sculptures. The project quickly picked up steam with the realization that the area is large enough for a dozen or more pieces of art. LMS board members Angelo Stio, Phoenix Smith, Theresa Wrobel, and Stacy Mann, along with Margareta Warlick representing the AMEBA group, have each had a hand in the initial planning steps needed to See SCULPTURES, Page 12
Lawrence soccer player Damian Szumigraj clears the ball during a 1-0 loss to West Windsor-Plainsboro High School North Sept. 6, 2018. For more boys’ and girls’ soccer coverage, turn to Page 14. (Staff photo by Samantha Sciarrotta.)
Adding culture to community Mosaic program season kicks off with White House reporter Oct. 28 By scoTT MorGaN If you’re not Jewish, you might not even be aware that Adath Israel Congregation exists. The Lawrence-based
congregation wants to change that in some thought-provoking and, frankly, entertaining ways. “We’re trying to do some exciting things,” says Brenda Solomon, a trustee at Adath Israel and chairperson of the synagogue’s Mosaic cultural program. “And not just for the Jewish community.” Mosaic, in a nutshell, is a cultural center for music, art, performance and thought, as
seen through a pluralistic Jewish lens, according to Adath’s website, with songs and stories, films and discussions. But that “pluralistic Jewish lens” is merely the beginning. So much about the Jewish story, says Adath’s Rabbi, Benjamin Adler, is universal. Take, for example, an event the congregation hosted last year while Adler and Solomon were starting to See MOSAIC, Page 8
The first rule of education is, make sure you know what you’re doing in the subject you’re teaching. Or, at least, that ought to be the first rule. For guidance in how to make sure that happens, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to consult the Lawrence Township School District, which is putting a new grant to use by teaching the teachers how to better understand STEM education in grades K to 5 this year. The district, through the Lawrence Township Education Foundation, will be using $24,437 in grant money from Bristol-Myers Squibb to bring teachers up to speed with New Jersey’s most recent engineering education standards. These days, said Karen Faiman, executive director of the Lawrence Township Education Foundation, STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) is everywhere in schools, all the way down to kindergarten, and the state demands that even kids in their first year of school understand certain principles about how those subjects work. The trouble, said Kristin Burke, the district’s supervisor of education for math and science for grades pre-K to 6, is that “the engineering component is new to teachers—what a scientist does and what an engineer does, applying science knowledge to real-world See STEM, Page 10
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