Education Jewish News December 18, 2017

Education Matters

Supplement to Jewish News December 18, 2017 jewishnewsva.org | December 18, 2017 | Education | Jewish News | 15

Education Matters Beth El welcomes the Park Place School Patti Wainger

W

alking through Congregation Beth El’s education wing on a weekday, one might be surprised to hear the sounds of violins. The source of the music is from students who attend the Park Place School, located at Beth El since August.

Each of the 66 second through sixth graders who attend the school take weekly violin instruction in addition to participating in a robust enrichment program that includes art instruction, a global Citizenship class, and social and emotional training. The core class instruction is rooted in national and state standards and is shaped by individual needs in each

classroom of 15 students. Students who are eligible for free or reduced lunch— and who were not thriving in school—are the participants in the privately funded, tuition-free program.

Park Place School started in 1996 as a three-year pilot program, Project Rebound. The program targeted 10 Norfolk Public School students who improved their test scores in core subjects for reading, math, and spelling an average of about 20 percentage points. After completion of the three-year pilot project, the students re-enrolled into the Norfolk Public Schools working at, or above grade level. All students who attended Project Rebound graduated from high school.

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Since moving to their new home this fall, Park Place students and staff have been welcomed with open arms by the Beth El family and the community at large. Beth El has provided volunteers working in creative writing and the BEAR reading program, congregants collected and donated 54 Thanksgiving meals, and Sisterhood hosted a holiday luncheon with gifts for all. As the word spreads, other groups are lending support. Virginian Wesleyan students conducted a food and clothing drive for Park Place students, and Norfolk Academy is partnering with the school by sending middle school students to do community service and enrichment projects.

The opportunities are limitless to help these incredible students. To lend support to the Park Place School, contact aphillips@parkplaceschool.org.

Education Matters Setting all students up for success at Hebrew Academy of Tidewater Jewish Proverb: “Who is wise? The one who learns from every person.”

Carin Simon

A ROMAN HOLIDAY

W

hile a Jewish Day School experience is often considered a homogeneous education, within every group of students, a range of abilities always exists. Hebrew Academy of Tidewater’s goal, therefore, is to create a caring community so that students feel comfortable asking for help and accepting that help from teachers and fellow students.

Everyone has a strength Many of HAT’s “mission appropriate” students may thrive at the school, but have a learning disability or attention issue that makes learning more difficult. In these cases, the faculty examines the student’s needs and designs strategies to set the student up for success. The school emphasizes that all students have both strengths and areas for growth, and everyone learns from each other.

Small classes mean individual attention With class sizes of fewer than 20 students, HAT teachers offer differentiated instruction. Students can be seen working one-on-one with a teacher as other students work independently. The school’s project-based learning approach allows students to work in groups to explore, create, and discuss ideas. As a result, students feel motivated and excited.

Fidget time HAT understands that young children need to fidget. Their little bodies are not made to sit still for hours at a time. HAT classrooms, therefore, are equipped with enhancements such as bouncy chairs, stationary bikes to use while seated, a standing desk, and a cord that attaches to a desk for resting feet. When students are comfortable in their classroom, they tend to focus better on their classwork.

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JoAnn Falletta, conductor Tianwa Yang, violin

Share the warmth of the seven hills of Rome.

This enchanting concert includes Beethoven’s beloved Violin Concerto performed by soloist Tianwa Yang, and the beautiful Intermezzo from Cavelleria Rusticana is one of those timeless pieces you never forget.

Study skills Teaching students self help skills is key in a classroom with a variety of skill levels.

In additon to posted visual aids to help students follow directions, opportunities for partner work allow students to collaborate and alleviate the pressure of “getting everything right.” Students are taught study skills such as how to break up work into chunks and to study each night when a test is planned for the end of the week.

Student Support Specialist When teachers are concerned about a child’s performance, they speak with the Student Support Team. The Student Support Specialist meets each day with select students to provide extra support and ensure that each student’s educational needs are met. This support might be extra tutoring, help with organization, or ongoing classroom assistance.

Strategies for anxiety Students have all sorts of worries which can impact both behavior and academic performance. Understanding that behavior problems often stem from school

anxiety, HAT introduced a mindfulness program last year. Starting the school day with a short yoga class to calm their minds, followed by a lesson on social and emotional skills using the Second Step Program, the children were taught how to communicate their worries, along with strategies to employ when worries arise.

Accepted at the best Hebrew Academy’s mission and responsibility is to provide the best education to its student body. The early years, or preschool through grade five are essential in providing an education that delivers students the academic, social, and emotional skills to set them up for success as they develop into independent learners.

As a testament to this job, very year, HAT students are accepted to the most competitive public and private middle school programs in Tidewater.

To schedule a tour of the Hebrew Academy of Tidewater, contact Carin Simon, admissions director at 757-424-4327 or csimon@hebrewacademy.net.

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Education Matters Dance about Kristallnacht inspired by UJFT Holocaust Commission conference O

ver many decades of creating choreography that conveys an emotional story, Elbert Watson, Norfolk Academy dance director, has covered many searing topics. Most notably, he has developed dances that explore aspects of AfricanAmerican history, from slavery to the Civil Rights Movement.

Although Watson possessed an active interest in exploring the role of prejudice and ethnic hatred in creating a climate in Europe that led to the persecution and murder of six million Jews by the Nazi regime and its collaborators, he had never created a solo dance about the Holocaust.

This summer, Watson attended the Educators’ Conference at Norfolk

Academy, which was sponsored by the Holocaust Commission of the United Jewish Federation of Tidewater. The creative spark was kindled by one of the authors who spoke at the conference: Alexandra Zapruder, who spent more than a decade creating Salvaged Pages: Young Writers’ Diaries of the Holocaust.

Watson began reading the volume and got hooked. He decided to create a dance inspired by the diary entries of Klaus Langer about a young German girl’s experience of Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass. In November 1938, Kristallnacht was an organized wave of anti-Jewish attacks that took place in Germany and Austria, when rioting mobs looted thousands of Jewish businesses and pillaged or torched 267 synagogues, with an

estimated 30,000 Jewish men arrested by the Gestapo.

The dance was featured in Norfolk Academy’s fall dance concert with Mary Alice Russell ’18 as the soloist. Russell has acted in school plays and taken dance lessons with Watson since her Lower School years. She performed last year as Glinda the Good Witch in Norfolk Academy’s Winter Musical, The Wizard of Oz. Watson says that Russell’s experience was crucial.

“You have to bring the ugly! You have to do that to create the empathy.”

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Steve Budman.

Esther Diskin

“I needed a dancer who could act,” he says. “Many dancers are afraid to immerse themselves in the acting process.”

Still, the harrowing aspects of the situation posed an incredible, even exhausting challenge, Russell notes. “I am usually a happy, positive person. I have played happy roles and some sassy roles. I had never played someone who faced, and will face, oppression.”

The dance takes place on a bare stage, save for a large, plush armchair at the center, where a young girl reads a magazine. She seems entertained, until something catches her eye as she flips the pages, and her mood briefly darkens. After an interval, she puts down the magazine and twirls around the room, seeming to delight in her solitude; at one point, she seems to hear some disturbance but decides to ignore it.

As she returns to the chair and appears

Elbert Watson.

to doze off, the theater fills with the sound of shattering glass; as the girl leaps about the room in panic, the audience shares her fear, as the crackling, crunching sound of glass continues for several unbearable minutes. When the girl tips over the chair and hides behind it, the audience fully appreciates the depth of her terror.

Watson acknowledges that those moments, and the actions of the dancer stuffing her suitcase frantically and then heading out the door, are not beautiful to watch. “I have seen pieces done about the Holocaust, and some of them are moving, but they are also sometimes pretty,” he says. “You have to bring the ugly! You have to do that to create the empathy.”

Watson says that he plans to continue developing the dance about Kristallnacht, and perhaps get one of the dancers in his professional troupe to perform it. For Russell, even after stepping out of that character, the impact of the dance shapes her thinking about world events and even personal activism.

“It is hard for me to think about how the character is fighting for her life.… Her life, as she has known it is over,” she says.

“It was a terrible, terrible thing. It cannot happen again.”

Education Matters ADL resource helps college students learn how to deal with anti-Semitism and anti-Israel bias on campus New York, NY—The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has a new, multi-platform resource to equip college students with essential information and tools to deal with anti-Semitism and anti-Israel bias on campus.

‘THINK. PLAN. ACT.’ is a comprehensive resource that prepares students for encounters with anti-Semitism and anti-Israel bias by defining what constitutes anti-Jewish animus, anti-Zionism, and anti-Israel rhetoric and provides students with proactive strategies to deal with anti-Semitic incidents and prevent anti-Israel activity on campus. Through scenarios, videos and how-tos, the resource identifies examples and appropriate responses to common anti-Israel and anti-Semitic incidents students face, which include: • Mock anti-Israel demolition notices; • Swastikas and other forms of anti-Semitic vandalism; • Key information on free speech issues, including a set of tips on how to work with college administrators.

As part of the project, ADL produced an online resource featuring a series of testimonials of personal anecdotes from students who have confronted anti-Israel activity or experienced anti-Semitism on their respective campuses as well as a video explaining anti-Semitism and anti-Israel bias. The resource is available online at www.adl.org/ThinkPlanAct. Hard copies of the publication are available.

“The reality is most Jewish students and pro-Israel advocates have positive experiences on campus. However, some students continue to face anti-Semitic incidents on their campuses as well as anti-Israel activity, some of which crosses the line into anti-Semitism,” says Jonathan A. Greenblatt, ADL CEO. “With this resource, we hope to give students the tools to respond effectively. Students should know there’s great support on campus for them from the administration and Jewish life groups.”

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Education Matters Virginia Arts Festival’s education outreach makes learning leap to life Alli Focke

F

or more than 20 years, the Virginia Arts Festival has brought renowned artists from around the globe to Hampton Roads. In addition to the packed schedule of world-class performances, the Festival reaches out to students each year. In fact, during the past school year, more than 39,000 area students saw performances and many even interacted with artists, allowing them to experience worlds beyond the classroom.

Virginia Arts Festival’s WorldClass® Education programs offer opportunities to explore the beauty and the power of the arts. Special student matinees allow students to feel the thrill of live performance in a theater or concert hall, and then incorporate the experience into class discussions and projects that open students’ minds to new ways of learning. The Festival also schedules in-school performances or master classes Richard Alston Dance instructs a group of Governor’s School for the Arts dance students on May 2, 2017.

that bring these renowned artists into the classroom to share their gifts, their knowledge, and their experiences.

“We take a very collaborative approach to our programs, working with teachers to supplement and enrich their curriculum,” says Christine Foust, director of education and community engagement at the Virginia Arts Festival. “We listen to their goals, needs, and concerns and work together to prepare students for our education programs.”

The Festival can bring a string quartet into a school where a student who is studying cello may hear their instrument performed at a professional level for the first time, says Foust. “When a young thespian or dancer attends a performance, it can open their eyes to the possibilities of what they are studying. It is a really meaningful and motivating experience that students might not get otherwise.”

WorldClass® Education programs set for 2018 include Macbeth with the American Shakespeare Center on Tour ( January 17); storyteller Charlotte Blake Alston

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Royal Winnipeg Ballet leads a dance masterclass at Brickell Academy on March 30, 2017.

(February 8); Rhythm Live! (February 23); Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (March 2); Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Romeo and Juliet with the Virginia Symphony Orchestra (April 20); and the Virginia International Tattoo (April 25–27). Dozens of in-school performances, workshops, and master classes are also planned. For full details on these programs and more information, visit www. vafest.org/education.

Education Matters

Small School ...BIG IMPACT

Starting a B’nai Tzedek fund comes naturally for Liora Kaplan

A

Barb Gelb

bright, articulate, and very composed 13-year-old who became a Bat Mitzvah last month, Liora Kaplan also became a philanthropist, starting a B’nai Tzedek Teen Philanthropy Fund at the Tidewater Jewish Foundation.

Liora learned about B’nai Tzedek over a year ago when her father, Scott Kaplan, TJF’s president and CEO, first launched the program and asked Liora’s opinion of the flyer Liora Kaplan. being created for the program.

Liora says she chose to participate in the B’nai Tzedek Teen Philanthropy Fund because she thought it would be a way to continue doing something Jewish after her Bat Mitzvah.

Not surprisingly, the Kaplan family already has a tradition of Tzedakah. Each Hanukkah, they designate one night that they don’t get presents, but instead give Tzedakah, deciding where to give as a family. For Liora, then, making the decision to start her own fund was a natural continuation of what she learned from her family about giving.

When a teen donates $250 or more to start a philanthropic fund, TJF matches up to $250. Each year the teen gets to make a distribution of 5% of their fund to a Jewish charitable organization.

Liora says she hopes to use her fund to help people who need it and to make a difference. She thinks other teens should get involved too, saying, “They’ll feel good about it in the future—it’s a great way to continue to be involved.”

For more information on starting a B’nai Tzedek Fund, contact Barb Gelb at bgelb@ujft.org or 757-965-6105.

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jewishnewsva.org | December 18, 2017 | Education | Jewish News | 21

Education Matters Hillel International’s ‘Jewish College Bound’ tool helps students make connections WASHINGTON—One of the greatest challenges for college students can be finding a place on campus where they feel at home and can form a community in an unfamiliar place. As the center for Jewish life on 550 college campuses around the world, Hillel helps ease students into the college experience and provides ways to

make new friends and connections.

It’s possible for the process to start even before students step foot on campus through Jewish College Bound, Hillel International’s tool to connect incoming freshmen with their local Hillel. Parents, youth group advisors, or students themselves can submit the students’ contact

information and receive information from local Hillel staff and student leaders.

“Even for students who aren’t sure how to get involved in Jewish life, Hillel can show them numerous opportunities to find their home away from home on campus,” says Paige Gutter, a rising junior at Miami University of Ohio.

Jewish College Bound is part of Hillel’s efforts to ensure students find a community on campus where they can create the connections that will ensure their Jewish futures and solidify their cultural and religious identity in ways that represent their own unique backgrounds and life goals.

Have an out of the ordinary winter at the Simon Family JCC. Enjoy arts, crafts, cooking workshops, swimming, science projects, and more!

Camp Dates: December 21st - December 29th Monday through Friday 6 am to 6 pm Pre-Registration required For more information and to register, call 757-321-2338 or visit www.SimonFamilyJCC.org.

22 | Jewish News | December 18, 2017 | jewishnewsva.org

Education Matters This classroom job in my kid’s pre-K made me a Jewish day school believer Carla Naumburg

(Kveller via JTA)—For some parents, sending their children to Jewish day school is a given. Perhaps they went to day school and want that same experience for their kids, or perhaps they didn’t and wish they had.

This was not the case with my husband and me. He’s a day school grad who felt no particular need to continue that legacy. As the product of a completely secular upbringing, I have often wished for a stronger Jewish education, but I wasn’t sure if that was enough of a reason to justify the financial burden and schlepping required to get my girls across town each day to a Jewish school.

Nonetheless, when my older daughter reached pre-K, I found myself touring two of the four Jewish day schools within driving distance of our house. During those tours, it was apparent that my girls would get a strong secular education, as well as fluency in Hebrew, a strong Jewish identity, and a deep understanding of Jewish texts, values, and practices that I never got as a kid.

Most of all, they’d know where they came from, where they belong and where they could always return. I loved that.

But I wondered if my husband and I couldn’t give our daughters a good-enough Jewish education and identity—with the help of our synagogue, Hebrew school, and extended family. We could hire a tutor, send them to Jewish summer camp and visit Israel.

That would be enough, wouldn’t it?

For us, day school would be a leap of faith, and I remember the exact moment I saw clear to make that leap. Josh and I were touring the kindergarten classroom at the Jewish Community Day School outside of Boston. In many ways, it looked the public school kindergarten classroom I remember from own upbringing, just with more Hebrew.

There was a large circular rug on the floor with each child’s name written on strips of tape. Small plastic chairs were

situated at round tables with the kids’ names in English and Hebrew. The walls were covered with the alphabet and Aleph Bet, and kids’ artwork. A toy Shabbat set complete with wooden candlesticks, kiddush cup and challah sat on a small table.

There were blocks and legos, costumes and masks, and lots of books in Hebrew and English.

You walk your classmate to the nurse’s office even if he’s the one who kicked you yesterday, even if she’s the girl you excluded at recess, because that’s what Judaism teaches.

The teacher led us to a board on the wall that listed all the classroom jobs, with a space for a child’s name next to each role. There was the beloved line

leader, of course, and several other fairly common roles.

But I was captivated by one particular job: the class comforter. The class comforter has two primary responsibilities: to accompany a sick classmate to the nurse’s office and, along with the teacher, to call children who are sick at home to wish them a “refuah shleimah,” a full recovery.

I felt my eyes welling up as the admissions director described this. I had rarely heard of a school calling sick children at home to check on them, and in the few cases I had it was always the teacher calling, often with a reminder about making up work.

This was something entirely different.

This school was not only teaching the Jewish value of “bikkur cholim,” visiting or helping the sick, but it was showing the children how, in the most concrete possible way, to live those values in the context of community.

Being part of a community means helping and comforting those who need it, not because you’re their best friend or you’re bored with math. You walk your classmate to the nurse’s office even if he’s the one who kicked you yesterday, even if she’s the girl you excluded at recess, because that’s what Judaism teaches.

I was thinking about my own daughter, a generally healthy child who was frequently home from preschool because of asthma, croup, ear infections, or other illnesses. I was thinking about what it would mean to her to get a phone call from a classmate on a sick day. You matter.

We’re thinking about you. We miss you, and we hope you come back soon.

My own experience of becoming a mother had been so much harder than I’d ever imagined. For the previous five years I had felt confused, anxious and scared.

The sheer number of decisions I had to make on a daily basis was overwhelming, and I frequently worried I was making the wrong choice. It was my community – my family and friends, our neighbors, our synagogue, and the new mother support groups I attended each week – that got me

through it. They gave me advice and ideas, and sat with me as I cried when there was no advice to be given.

I hadn’t really thought about what being part of a community meant before becoming a mother. It was just something I had fallen into by virtue of which dorm I happened to be assigned in college or where I worked. Once I became a mother, I was fortunate to live in a town and be part of a religion and culture that values community.

When we signed up my daughter for day school, we were choosing to be a part of another community—for ourselves and for our children.

My daughters are now in third and second grade at Jewish Community Day School, and they are living and learning the values and practices I had hoped they would. In addition to studying literacy, math, engineering, and other secular subjects, their Hebrew is better than mine.

My younger daughter helps lead services on Friday night. They are grappling with the Torah’s stories, what they mean and how they are relevant to life in the 21st century.

Most important, they are learning, in the words of Ram Dass—a spiritual leader who grew up Jewish in the same town where we live—that we’re all just walking each other home. Or, in some cases, to the nurse’s office.

Carla Naumburg, Ph.D., is a clinical social worker and writer. She is the author of two books, Parenting in the Present Moment: How to Stay Focused on What Really Matters [Parallax, 2014] and Ready, Set, Breathe: Practicing Mindfulness with Your Children for Fewer Meltdowns and a More Peaceful Family [New Harbinger, 2015].

This article was sponsored by and produced in partnership with the Avi Chai Foundation, which is committed to the perpetuation of the Jewish people, Judaism and the centrality of the State of Israel to the Jewish people. In North America, the foundation works to advance the Jewish day school and overnight summer camp fields.

jewishnewsva.org | December 18, 2017 | Education | Jewish News | 23

Education Matters First Person

From Brooklyn to Norfolk State Dr. Scott M. Debb

I

Dr. Scott M. Debb

grew up in a not so religious American Jewish household in a heavily Orthodox section of Brooklyn in the 1980s. I felt disconnected from my culture and outcast from the community, even though it surrounded me. Only a few generations removed from an Orthodox ancestry, I have learned more about my great grandparents’ Eastern European roots, their (cultural) arrival in the U.S., and in particular, my grandmother’s early life growing up on Lower East Side of NYC. She lived through the Great Depression, the fall of Nazi Germany, and was a staunch advocate for civil rights including women’s empowerment and community activism.

She died not to long into 5776, and her

Employment Oppor tunity Director of Summer Day Camp & Children/Family Programming Seeking an energetic, organized, and articulate individual with excellent people skills to oversee and coordinate the Summer Camp and Children/Family Programs at the UJFT/Simon Family JCC. Independent judgment, initiative, and creative program planning skills required.

The ideal candidate enjoys interacting with children and is dedicated to promoting an appreciation for Jewish culture and values. Must be proficient in preparing yearly budgets, maintaining fiscal responsibility, and administrative management with willingness to work evenings, weekends, and holidays.

Experience in hiring, training, and supervising summer camp and volunteer staff, required.

Qualifications include, but not limited to: BA/BS degree from an accredited college or university; 3-5 years proven leadership experience directing a Summer Day Camp and Children & Family Programs; Detail-orientated; Ability to communicate to Jewish, Interfaith, and general audiences; and Strong proficiency in the Microsoft Office Suite.

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Complete job description at: www.simonfamilyjcc.org.

Submit cover letter, resume, and salary requirements to: resumes@ujft.org The United Jewish Federation of Tidewater/ Marilyn and Marvin Simon Family Jewish Community Center is firmly committed to a policy of equal employment opportunity for all qualified persons without regard to race, color, religion, national origin, age, gender, sexual orientation, non-disqualifying disability or veteran status.

Equal Employment Opportunity

24 | Jewish News | Education | December 18, 2017 | jewishnewsva.org

92 years can be characterized by the image of a physically small 85-year-old great-grandmother taking a city bus to diverse areas of Brooklyn to assist with campaigning on the street leading up to the 44th Presidential election.

I have been inspired by my grandmother’s acumen for facilitating change, and motivated by my relatively new-found connectivity within the Jewish community.

In this age of global connectivity and technology-driven collective knowledge, what it means to be a human is fundamentally changing. We must work to understand how these changes are both a function of, and contribute to, our fastpaced, instant-access world. I never had the opportunity to fully understand my Jewish identity during my childhood, and I can only wonder how I might be different today if technology and connectivity were so omnipresent three decades ago.

Life can be chunked into stages and at this point, I exist in a reality that allows me to impact not just my three children, but also the next cohort of change-makers and leaders of the world. I have worked my way through a semblance of a lowlevel managerial career, into a world of counseling and crisis intervention for at-risk children, and now predominantly university research and teaching students at the bachelors, masters, and doctoral levels. To a flaw, I have a passion for this work that transcends the standard 9-5 job, and although it may sometimes appear as workaholism, that is an oversimplification that serves no justice regarding why I do what I do and to the extent that I do it.

I have the privilege of working at Norfolk State University as a professor of psychology. I teach introductory level psychology courses, oversee the undergraduate practicum students getting real-world experience in the field, and assist with coordination and teaching doctoral students in the Virginia Consortium Program in Clinical Psychology, a collaborative partnership between NSU, ODU, and EVMS. I conduct research into quality of life issues, resilience and coping, and more recently cyber-psychology, and I am a research mentor for incoming Doctoral students who share common clinical and research interests. My position has allowed me to create new new curriculum in the area of conflict analysis and the development and coordination of a new masters degree program to be offered at NSU in the area of cyber-psychology.

Engaging in these activities has allowed me to develop friendships with like-minded people across the globe. I have been inspired by my grandmother’s acumen for facilitating change, humbled by the realization of not being able to change the world—a lesson learned daily while working with children and families in crisis—and motivated by my relatively new-found connectivity within the Jewish community. This latter point became undeniable after completing the Hineni Young Leadership Mission to Israel this past June, which was simultaneously the best and worst experience of my life, but ultimately motivated me to become more involved in boards and committees that affect Jews in this area. As part of the Community Relations Council and a member of the NSU community, the goal now is to help connect these two worlds through campus events and outreach activities.

Dr. Scott M. Debb, Licensed Professional Counselor and assistant professor of psychology and practicum coordinator and CyberPsychology director at Norfolk State University.

K-5th

The Hebrew Academy of Tidewater inspires academic excellence within a warm community environment

Guided by four core values: Respect ‫כבוד‬

Community

‫קהילה‬ Repairing the World ‫תיקון עולם‬ Love of Learning ‫תורה לשמה‬

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jewishnewsva.org | December 18, 2017 | Education | Jewish News | 25

Education Matters The David Project Joining Hillel International

Pro-Israel Campus Advocacy group to become part of the Hillel Movement WASHINGTON, D.C.—Hillel International has reached an agreement with The David Project to integrate the pro-Israel group into Hinenu, Hillel’s Israel education and engagement department.

The two organizations have a long-established partnership that will be formalized to serve the missions of both organizations. The David Project will strengthen its proven methodology for building diverse pro-Israel support on campus, while helping Hillel empower Jewish students on campus to create enduring connections to Israel.

“Hillel values the approach The David Project has taken to build strong relationships on campus with a wide array of students to strengthen the pro-Israel community,” says Eric D. Fingerhut, Hillel International president and CEO. “This work complements Hillel’s vision of broadening the network of support for Israel throughout the campus. We are proud to incorporate The David Project into Hillel International and together grow this program to impact more students.”

The David Project reached 10,000 Jewish and

non-Jewish students this past academic year on 45 campuses, cultivating student leaders and organizations as allies for Hillel and the pro-Israel community. The David Project trained activists to engage their peers on campus through individual conversations, group programming and The David Project’s “Israel Uncovered” mission. The David Project empowers 300 interns each year at Hillels to better articulate their support for Israel and reach out to their peers beyond the Jewish community.

“We are eager to begin this new chapter as part of Hillel,” says Phillip Brodsky, executive director of The David Project. “Our partnership with Hillel will strengthen our work so that we can continue to grow our movement of Jewish and non-Jewish students excited to talk about Israel and bring their communities together.”

The David Project will continue to be led and staffed by its current employees under the guidance of an advisory board to be created together with Hillel. It will gain access to Hillel’s operational, development and marketing infrastructure, management team, and vast campus

The David Project reached 10,000 Jewish and non-Jewish students this past academic year on 45 campuses, cultivating student leaders and organizations as allies for Hillel and the pro-Israel community. network and partnerships.

The David Project and Hillel International have been close partners for more than five years, and currently work together on 45 campuses. The mission of The David Project will remain unchanged: empowering Jewish and non-Jewish student leaders to build mutually beneficial and enduring partnerships with diverse student organizations so that the Israel community is integrated and valued on campus.

Winter Children’s Classes Starting January 3 | Ages 3–8 Yoga With Brigitte!

Develop concentration and build self-confidence by connecting body and mind.

Cheerleading With Message in Motion

Learn basic cheer techniques such as motions, jumps, chants and cheers, dance, and stunts.

Princesses and Superheroes with Little Scholars Save the world from evil-doers everywhere in this interactive and high energy class.

Wiz Kids with Little Scholars Explore the world of science through everyday objects, experiments, and encounters.

For more information, or to register, visit www.SimonFamilyJCC.org/ChildrensClasses or contact Jasmine Edwards: jedwards@simonfamilyjcc.org or 757-321-2327.

26 | Jewish News | Education | December 18, 2017 | jewishnewsva.org