A Floor, But Not a Ceiling

Sticks & Stones

It has been a big month for this blog!

The trouble with major initiatives and new programs is that it makes the “normal” weeks feel boring by comparison! Over the last three weeks, I’ve introduced edJEWcon 5772.0 (with frequent updates via Twitter, @edJEWcon, about exciting keynote speakers and the application process); Jon’s #NoOfficeDay, which takes place this September 13th and will be the subject of next week’s blog post); and described The Inclusive Jewish Day School we are striving to be. Who can keep up the pace!

This week, I have nothing quite as sexy to report on, but it may be of equal or even greater importance to the overall health and wellbeing of our students and our school. I want to talk a little bit about “bullying” and how our school and synagogue is striving to keep our children physically, emotionally and spiritually safe.

“Bullying” (which I am putting in quotes to signify how loaded a term it has become) exists in all forms and in all schools. It can be qualified (physical, emotional, virtual or cyber, exclusionary, etc.) as well as quantified (how many children affected, how often do incidents occur, etc.) – but it cannot be responsibly ignored. The only relevant question is how to reduce it – how do we make our schools and synagogues as safe and nurturing as we can?

Surprise! There is no magic bullet! There are tons of books, programs, videos and assemblies of different qualities that schools often use to address this issue. So why is it still so prevalent?

My guess? It takes an institutional commitment that is hard to maintain in order to reduce bullying to its most minimal level.

Thanks to the hard work of two of our parents (one of whom has children in both our Day and Religious Schools) and our new Second Rabbi, Jesse Olitzky, we are in the process of developing just such an institutional approach to reducing bullying at the Jacksonville Jewish Center in all its schools and programs. We will look to incorporate successful strategies from other schools, the latest research, survey data from our children, parents and teachers, and the synergetic partnership of our clergy to couch everything in the Jewish values we strive to live up to each and every day.

Consider this the teaser.

Together, we look forward to making our schools the safe nurturing environment for learning we have been entrusted to create. Working together – parent, student, teacher, administration, clergy, Preschool, Day School, Religious School, Makom, USY, etc. – we will do more than any of us could accomplish alone.

This is not a “Day School” issue – you can be a parent in any of our schools or programs to participate (and the more variety the better). You don’t have to be a parent at all, in fact. If this subject speaks to you and you want to be part of the solution, please let me know and you can be part of the planning.

Next week: Video from Jon’s #NoOfficeDay!

The Inclusive Jewish Day School

While the rest of the country is preparing to head “Back to School” after Labor Day, we are completing our SECOND WEEK of school already!

We have lots of exciting things going on:

You can check out the ongoing saga of the “Frognapping of Froggy Mitzhopper” by visiting our website and clicking on the videos here. (I think my acting chops are rounding into fine form!)
The MJGDS Marlins are about to make history by playing the first away game in our school’s 50-year history! You can order booster shirts by emailing the School Office ([email protected]) and can read more about the Marlins on the PE Blog here.
Singapore Math Parent Night will take place on September 12 at 7:00 PM. You can read more about our philosophical shift towards a new math curriculum here and about our move to Singapore Math here.
As announced in last week’s blog, my #NoOfficeDay will take place on September 13th. I am excited to spend my day with teachers and students and I look forward to blogging about my experience.

But what I really want to write about this week is a remarkable development taking place within our school – our growing ability to become the inclusive Jewish day school our community and families deserve. I wrote the following in a prior blog post at the end of last year:

“We have also taken great strides in our outreach to special needs families and in our current practice in putting together processes for dealing with the mechanics of delivering services. We take it as a positive sign that KoleinuJax has gifted us (in collaboration with Jewish Family & Community Services and the Jewish Community Foundation of Northeast Florida) the monies necessary to expand our program next year by allowing us to hire and train additional support staff in classes where we have children with special needs.”

We are two weeks in and “shofar so good”! (I only have until the High Holidays to enjoy my favorite pun…sorry in advance!) We have, shofar (see how much fun that is!), sent out assistant teachers to a Duval County training and hosted a training of our own for our entire faculty. We are presently meeting with prospective special needs educators for the purpose of scheduling observations of our classes and, then, targeting training specific to the needs of our children and our teachers. We have been meeting and communicating more frequently with parents of special needs students in our school with the goal of being as proactive as we can as sacred partners. And finally, thanks in large part to the hard work of two parents in our school, we are preparing to become eligible this month to receive McKay Scholarships.

The McKay Scholarship Program (according to its website) is defined as such:

“Florida’s school choice programs ensure that no child will be left behind by allowing parents to choose the best educational setting—public or private—for their child. The McKay Scholarships for Students with Disabilities Program provided over 22,000 Florida students with special needs the opportunity to attend a participating private school during the 2010-11 school year. The McKay Scholarships Program also offers parents public school choice. A parent of an eligible special needs student may choose to transfer the student to another public school.”

The Martin J. Gottlieb Day School is committed to doing its part to serve the special needs children of the Jewish Community of Jacksonville. Our eligibility to participate in McKay signals our desire to be in the conversation as a possible “best educational setting” for Jewish children with special needs. It does not mean that we are automatically capable of handling each and every situation appropriately. It does not mean that we are, in fact, the “best educational setting” for each Jewish child with special needs. It is hard to imagine any (private) school that can possibly claim to be that – there is way too much variation in resources, mission and children for any one school to be the “best educational setting” for every child. It does mean, however, that we have elevated ourselves into the conversation – we are invested in being capable to work with families to determine if we are the best setting, to prepare a structure for children to be successful when they enroll, to establish processes to evaluate our successes and failures, and to maintain healthy communication to take next steps as they occur.

McKay provides families who are usually already burdened with the additional expenses associated with special needs with funding that could make or break the difference between being able to afford private school tuition or not. It is our sincerest hope that IF Jewish families in Jacksonville would like their children to have a Jewish day school education and IF our school is capable of meeting their needs, that McKay will allow those families a choice they may never have had available until now.

Disclaimer: My wife is a special needs educator whose academic and professional experience is with “special education inclusion”.

I recently reviewed my research in this area and I think this link, here, from the Wisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC) provides good definitions, a concise history of inclusion, decent explanations of federal law, a fair framing of the debate between “full inclusion” and “resource room”, and examples of academic research. I encourage you to read the whole thing. But for my purposes, let me quote a few highlights:

Inclusion
Inclusion is a term which expresses commitment to educate each child, to the maximum extent appropriate, in the school and classroom he or she would otherwise attend. It involves bringing the support services to the child (rather than moving the child to the services) and requires only that the child will benefit from being in the class (rather than having to keep up with the other students). Proponents of inclusion generally favor newer forms of education service delivery.

This would be an accurate expression of our attitude and aspirations for the children in our school with special needs. (Please understand that GIFTEDNESS is a SPECIAL NEED. “Inclusion” includes our philosophy of how we strive to meet the needs of gifted students as well.)

I am being this descriptive because I want to address a common concern – how will having special needs students in my child’s class impact the experience ofmy child? Or, won’t the teacher have to spend so much time focusing on the special needs students that s/he won’t be able to provide my child with the individualized attention we expect in private school?

First the research…

There is no evidence that the inclusion of special needs students has any negative impact on the academic experience of the other students if the classroom is structured and staffed appropriately. This is why the conversation about whether or not a school is the “best educational setting” is so important. We have to be honest with parents about our resources and abilities. We should never bring in a child with needs we are not confident we can meet – that risks harm to the child and to the class. Each child and each situation is different and is handled case by case. But with the right attitude, support, and training – we are moving to be more capable with more students.

So if there is no impact on the academic experience of the other students…might there be other extremely important and positive outcomes of having special needs students in the classroom? YES!

While researchers are cautious in their conclusions, there are some positive signs. In particular, students in special education and regular education showed several positive changes, including:

A reduced fear of human differences accompanied by increased comfort and awareness (Peck et al., 1992);
Growth in social cognition (Murray-Seegert,1989);
Improvement in self-concept of non-disabled students (Peck et. al., 1992);
Development of personal principles and ability to assume an advocacy role toward their peers and friends with disabilities;
Warm and caring friendships (Bogdan and Taylor, 1989).

Do these not seem like the kinds of values a Jewish day school ought to live by? Would this not represent our highest aspirations for the moral development of our children? Does this not seem like a good way of making menchen?

We have a passion for meeting the needs of the Jewish children of Jacksonville – special or otherwise. One doesn’t have to choose between meeting the needs of special needs children or the highly gifted (or the overwhelming majority of children who are neither). Our work with special needs children and their families does not detract from our work with all of our other children and families – it enhances it.

When my daughter graduates (please God many years from now) from the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School and I watch her walk across the bimah to receive her diploma, my wife and I will surely be proud of her academic achievements (whatever they may be). But we will be even more proud of who she will have become having learned to love and respect all her classmates no matter who they are, what they know or can do, or however quirky their personality traits might be. And we will be blessed for having had the ability to have her educated in a place that doesn’t require families to have to choose between.

Jon’s #NoOfficeDay

On September 13th, I will officially participate in No Office Day!

David Truss first posted a blog here, describing in words and pictures his experience with a “No Office” Day and challenging the rest of us principals and heads to do the same. This challenge has been picked up by PEJE, whose guest blogger on August 19th, Rabbi Shira Leibowitz issued a similar challenge to Jewish day school principals and heads here – officially declaring that we should:

“Choose a day between September 12-15^th to close your office and spend the entire day with students and teachers: supporting, observing teaching, and participating in learning activities.”

PEJE was so invested in seeing us take this opportunity that they went ahead and incentivized our participation by holding a contest through their PEJE Facebook page…first five principals to commit gets a free Flip camera to document their “No Office” Day. Guess who was #2 and got himself a camera? I received it this week (thanks Ken Gordon @PEJEjds!) and officially blocked off the 13th of September as my official “No Office” Day!

How will I spend my day?

First off, I know how I won’t spend my day…in MEETINGS! Woo-hoo! My calendar has been cleared and blocked off – no parents, no vendors, no donors, no board members, no staff…a complete day dedicated to being with teachers and students in their “natural setting” (i.e. NOT my office). This, alone, should make it amongst the best days ever.

This is a great year for me to have this day because I have already made a commitment to do more teaching. I presently teach two classes in the Day School. I teach tefillah (prayer) to Grade One three afternoons a week and I am teaching a nine-week seminar on the same topic three mornings a week in Grade Eight. I am finished with my first week of teaching and I am thrilled to have made the decision. And the fact that my daughter, Eliana, is in Grade One allows me the pleasure of teaching my own daughter and the privilege of using gratuitous photos of her on my professional blog…like this one:

Not having come from the ranks of teaching (the full-time, all day variety – I do have a fair amount of teaching experience) into the headship, it is crucial to my ability to serve as the “Instructional Leader” for my faculty (one of the many hats a head wears) that I establish and maintain credibility as an actual teacher. Even if I had been a full-time teacher, it would likely remain just as important to keep those skills fresh. It is common to lots of professions that have administration as a rung on the career ladder – the better you are at doing the work, the farther away from it you get “promoted”. I love working with kids…I’m pretty good at it…and I rarely have the opportunity to do it anymore!

So thank you “No Office” Day. Thank you for giving me the extra push to do what I should have had the time management skills to do on my own. Thank you for the invitation to remind myself of what it is truly all about – teachers and students; learning and growing; hearts and minds.

If you want to find me on September 13th, don’t bother trying to find me in my office. The door will be shut and the lights will be out. If you want to find this principal on his “No Office” Day, head for where the real action is – the classrooms.

Looking forward to posting my experiences in a few weeks!

edJEWcon 5772.0

This is one of those weeks where it is difficult to decide who I am writing to and what I should be writing about. It is a good problem to have because there are so many exciting things happening! We just finished an amazing Preplanning Week highlighted by a Lower School “Meet the Teacher” on Thursday and today’s Middle School Orientation.

Here we all our decked out in our brand new MJGDS Marlins gear…Go Marlins!

And thanks to our super-fast, movie-making-maven, Marketing & Admissions Director Talie Zaifert, we have this awesome welcome back to school video:

So…with all of this excitement and with the first day of school coming on Monday…I just couldn’t wait to share the extraordinarily exciting news of a groundbreaking new conference in Jewish education that will take place at the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School this year. In cooperation with the Schechter Day School Network and with a generous grant and support from The AVI CHAI Foundation, we will bring to you this spring (“Save the Date” coming soon!) an amazing conference dedicated to 21st century learning in Jewish day school education…

Introducing: edJEWcon

Great thanks to our 21st century learning team, particularly Silvia Tolisano and Andrea Hernandez, in putting together the proposal for what we are hoping will become a paradigm-shifting experiment in professional development with the power to bring more and more Jewish day schools, beginning with the Schechter Network, down the 21st century learning path we try to blaze here at our school.

Idea

We are envisioning a conference based on 21st century professional development where attendees can experience a Jewish day school in transition to becoming a dynamic 21st century learning environment. We are sharing a vision of teaching and learning that transcends physical boundaries and connects across geographic borders and time zones. We acknowledge that Jewish day schools need to chart a new course, not only by adopting and adapting a secular educational movement, (The Partnership for 21st Century Learning http ://www .p 21.org/), but positioning Schechter Network schools, in particular, at the forefront of an exciting paradigm shift in education.

This first year pilot will create a template of a 21st century conference with the flexibility to grow beyond it and expand with the ultimate goal of becoming a premier destination for all forward-looking Jewish education stakeholders.

21st Century Professional Development

Professional development in the 21st century is rooted in the belief that educators need to experience the same skills, tools and teaching strategies that they are expected to develop and implement in their own classroom practice. The Partnership for 21st Century Learning points out that we need to give teachers and administrators opportunities and the tools to “identify what activities they can replace/de-emphasize”. 21st century professional development takes advantage of a virtual learning network that is available anytime and anywhere. New literacies of the 21st century, such as information, network, media and global literacies, demand that educators be fluent in communicating, collaborating and connecting through face-to-face, virtual and blended communities of global educators. Veteran educators who embrace this change are energized when they acquire these new skills and competencies; they engage their students with new media and technologies, incorporated into their deep and vast experience in the classroom.

What will make this conference distinctive and unique

A conference planned to meet the needs of Jewishly observant educators and the calendar of Jewish day schools
Specifically tailored to individual cross-disciplinary school teams in Jewish day schools with hands-on applications
The first conference to present a vision for 21st Century Jewish Day School Education and a roadmap to reach this desired desintation

Proposed Tracks

Administrators – how to lead a cultural change in your school
Technology & Curriculum Coordinators – what innovation could look like and how to drive it
Admissions and Marketing Directors – how to convey a compelling message to current & prospective parents who want their children to have the best of 21st century education;
Lay Leaders – how to understand and generate excitement about a unique approach to teaching and learning throughout the community;
Classroom Teachers – how to increase your students’ motivation and engagement in learning…and yours!

Implementation

The participatory nature of the conference will combine hands-on training, using 21st century tools, with an experiential component. The conference will include expert presentations, hands-on training and direct experiences in new practices. Using Alan November’s model of the Digital Learning Farm we will use authentic, meaningful roles and contributions to our learning community as a means to empower all learners.

The conference website (http://www.edjewcon.org) will be a collaborative environment for reflection and sharing as well as the hub for live social media feeds. Participants will be responsible for contributing to the site during the conference by sharing and reflecting on their learning. 21st century learning is participatory learning. Through collaboration, participants create a long term hub for dissemination, reflections, resource sharing with and for other Jewish educators and administrators.

Outcomes

Create a Professional Learning Network (PLN) for 21st Century Schechter Schools.

Each school will leave edJEWcon with its customizable road map for becoming a 21st century learning school. Depending on the school (and the members of the team able to participate), the pathways and timing of each journey will differ, but the destination remains the same. Heads of School will meet with Heads of School; Admissions Directors with Admissions Directors; Curriculum Supervisors with Curriculum Supervisors; etc.

Provide school team members with hands-on experiences of 21st century learning so they can not only return with information, but firsthand experience to share with their schools. We envision the conference operating fluidly between the tachlis (How do I most effectively blog or Tweet?) and the meta (How might my learning of best practices for blogging or using social media impact the classroom teachers in my school?).

I cannot wait to hear your comments and suggestions. I cannot wait to see what new partners come on board. I cannot wait to see which schools will look to join us on this grand new adventure in 21st century learning in the Jewish day school. I cannot wait to see how our school – parents, students, and faculty – will prepare to host this event. I cannot wait to see what our school will learn from you.

This is going to be a big year.

Summer’s Forgotten Holiday

NOTE: I will be on vacation from July 27th – August 10th and will likely take the next two weeks off from blogging. In fact, since I will be celebrating my 10-year anniversary during that time, let’s go ahead and say I will be taking two weeks off from blogging!

Each summer, nearer to the end than the beginning, comes the Jewish holiday of Tisha Be’Av (I am not providing a link because I will be defining and explaining below). This tends to be one of the least-acknowledged and commemorated holidays, unless you are summering at a Jewish summer camp. There are a variety of reasons for this, not the least of which, I am sure is that it is both a profoundly sad day and brings with it all the prohibitions of Yom Kippur, but with a longer and hotter day.

So in the spirit of encouraging exploration of this fascinating day on the Jewish calendar, I would like to provide you with some background and some suggested family activities that may, perhaps, allow you a way into summer’s forgotten holiday. [I’ve adapted this material from a summer camp curriculum I wrote a few years ago.]

Tisha Be’Av – The Ninth of Av

The ninth of the Hebrew month Av is a major fast day in the Jewish calendar, when we lament the date of the destruction of both the First and Second Temples, with the subsequent loss of national sovereignty and exile from the Holy Land. Tisha Be’Av is the culmination of a three week period of mourning, the last nine days of which are particularly intense, with observance of many customs similar to those practiced after a bereavement in the close family. The “Three Weeks” begin on the seventeenth of Tammuz, the date on which the outer walls of the city of Jerusalem were breached during a Roman siege. This is also the date which the Midrash claims Moses broke the first tablets of the Law when he came down from Mt. Sinai to find the people worshipping the Golden Calf.

On this day, the Babylonians destroyed the First Temple in 586 B.C.E., and the Romans burned the Second Temple in 70 C.E. This date marks as well the day on which the Jews of England were expelled from that country in 1290. The greatest catastrophe of medieval Jewish history, the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, occurred on the ninth of Av in 1492. It is also the date which marked the beginning of the Nazi deportation of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto…

The day is marked publicly in the State of Israel by the closure of restaurants, places of entertainment, etc., from the previous evening, with food shops open only for morning hours. The day is interpreted through its religious significance and/or its importance in connection with nationhood and national sovereignty-whether or not individuals choose to fast.

Traditional observance included the reading of Book of Lamentations, a 25 hour fast, deprivation of comfort and physical contact. In Jerusalem, thousands of people stream towards the Kotel, the Western and only remaining Wall of the Second Temple to commemorate the destruction and pray for redemption.

Religious Observance

Tisha Be’Av is marked by strict mourning practices and the reading of the Book of Lamentations. It is preceded by a meal called the seudah ha-mafseket (“the meal that interrupts”- that is, differentiates between a regular day and the fast day). It is usually a modest meal. Some people eat food that is customarily provided for mourners – hard-boiled eggs and lentils.

During Tisha Be’Av, as on Yom Kippur, the following are forbidden: eating, drinking, bathing, anointing with oil/perfume, wearing leather shoes, and sexual intercourse. Unique to Tisha Be’Av is a prohibition against the study of Torah, since studying Torah is a joyous activity. All that is permitted to be studied is the Book of Job, the parts of Jeremiah that describe the destruction of Jerusalem, and the sections of Talmud that deal with the destruction as well. Even though work is not forbidden, we are encouraged by the tradition to minimize the amount of work we do this day.

The synagogue service begins after sundown with ma’ariv (the evening service), followed by the reading of the Book of Lamentations (Eicha). It is customary to sit on the floor or on low benches during the reading, which is again similar to mourning customs. Only a few lights or candles are left on in the synagogue. The ark curtain (parokhet) is removed. The ma’ariv service is recited in hushed tones and Lamentations is chanted to its own special melody. At the end of Lamentations, the next-to-last verse is repeated by everyone so that the book will end on a hopeful note: “Turn to us, O God, and we shall be turned, renew our days as of old.” Following Lamentations, a series of piyyutim-liturgical poems-are recited. These prayers, known as kinot, describe the destruction of the Temple and the sins of the Jewish people.

While many people do not wear shoes all day long on Tisha Be’Av, others refrain from doing so only during services. The next morning, tallit and tefillin are not worn. This is another sign of mourning, because a mourner before the funeral does not put on tallit and tefillin. The Torah is read, and the congregants sit on the floor and recite kinot. The haftarah is from Jeremiah 8:13-9:23 and is chanted to the tune of Lamentations (except the last two verse, which are to the regular haftarah melody). At mincha (afternoon service), tallit and tefillin are worn and the Torah is read again. At the end of Tisha Be’Av, some people recite poetry by the medieval poet Yehuda Halevi which speaks eloquently about Israel and the Diaspora.

Extract from Lamentations:

In blazing anger God has cut down all

the might of Israel;

God has withdrawn God’s right hand in the

presence of the foe;

God had ravaged Jacob like flaming fire;

consuming on all sides.

Lamentations 2:3

Extracts from Yehuda Halevi

O beautiful one, joy of the universe,

City of the great King

For you, my soul has longed

From the furthest corner of the West.

My heart is in the East,

And I am at the farthest end of the West,

How can I taste,

How can anything in life be sweet?

Tisha Be’Av Values Clarification

Choose one of the following statements and answer the following questions:

Since the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948, we have no reason to commemorate Tisha Be’Av…the Jewish State has been restored.
It is important to use this day to remember the events which occurred in history on Tisha Be’Av, and the suffering of our ancestors.
Isaiah 40:24
Lamentations 2:3
With the establishment of Yom Ha’Shoah as another communal day of grief and mourning, Tisha Be’Av is no longer needed.
The destruction of the Temple was a blessing in disguise because it allowed Judaism to mature beyond sacrifice into prayer.
A statement which summarizes the laws of Tisha Be’Av.

a) Why did you choose this statement?

b) Put this statement into your own words.

c) Do you agree or disagree with this statement?

d) How does this statement relate to Tisha Be’Av?

e) What lessons can one learn from your statement?

f) Describe one way in which the statement you chose explains your personal connection to Tisha Be’Av?

g) Can you identify one new observance of Tisha Be’Av that you would be willing to experiment with this year? Which would it be and why?

A poem on behalf of those struggling to make sense…

It is storming outside.

And for too many I know and care about this week, it has been storming inside as well.

So I offer for those of faith who cannot make sense of what life is presently delivering a poem. I find that there are moments when prose simply will not do.

The following poem is unpublished and was written by Elisa Ewoldt, a close friend for nearly 25 years. She captures the struggling soul in a way I find both startling and oddly comforting. May it bring comfort to those who seek it.

god

I’m trying to move you out,

I’m needing to kick you out,

Create some additional space,

Free up some room in my mind for matters more consequential,

More substantial…

But I lie.

You are substance and consequence

You are a virus colonized in my heart my mind my lungs my glands

And there is no medium that can push you out.

I cannot speak fast enough,

I cannot write fast enough,

I cannot type fast enough,

I cannot beat you to the punch line or understand the stand up routine you perform.

And all the things I think I Know become things I only thought I knew

And all the things I think are Truth become things I tell myself in order to get through.

I am not at home here with you

I am not at home when you are in residence inside my intimate thoughts.

My home becomes a stage for execution with you presiding.

My brain seizes, I try to find something, anything, to grapple with that is not you

I create miscellaneous misanthropic beliefs and assign them to you

I decide what you believe and I attribute to you all brands of larceny.

You are not this colony in my mind. You are a wayside attraction, the largest ball of string, a museum above a highway, an unmarked detour on unmarked roads.

You cannot be this to me.

But you are.

And it is a terrible, beautiful, glorious travesty

Coming Attractions

Where did summer go?!

For many of you, it is still going strong, and to be honest when I consider that I haven’t worn socks since the last day of school, my summer is still going as well. But despite the summery feelings all abound, for those of us in schools…you can kind of feel the tug of the upcoming school year becoming noticeable. Partially due to our early (relative to the rest of the country) start…let’s just say “Back to School” isn’t just a tag-line for sales, it’s very much a’coming!

So, in the heart of July, perhaps with the midpoint of summer vacation upon us, I thought I’d take a moment and tease some of the coming attractions that will make next year, our best year yet! Cue the bullet points!

We have now done more than create the postcard. All of our K-5 General Studies Teachers attended a week-long training in June for the purpose of beginning to transition our students from our traditional math curriculum to Singapore Math. It just so happened to coincide with my family trip to Las Vegas, so the time zone allowed me to receive all sorts of emails and texts from our teachers during their training. It is a very exciting program and offers our students a wonderful opportunity to learn Math “as a second language”. You can look forward to Parent Information Nights, additional professional development sessions for teachers, “Not your mother’s math homework anymore” conversations, and most importantly – students who develop amazing critical thinking skills in mathematics.

We did it! We have finally created our own mascot – signaling our official entry into the world of Middle School Athletics! Thanks to Coach Goldman for motivating our students and making the arrangements. We look forward to at least two or three sports launching next year to compete against local schools. T-Shirts and other swag will be available for purchase next year with all proceeds going to support our new teams. Whether you are a player, a parent or just an MJGDS booster – be sure to show your support for the Marlins next year!

Enrollment for our new, enhanced Kindergarten Enrichment Program is beginning – as it dawns on parents that school is coming – to come in. We are very excited to be able to offer for the same fee as last year an enriched program for our Kindergartners from 1:45 – 3:45 PM. Under the direction of Mrs. Kristi O’Neill, our Kindergartners will have an opportunity for free play, snack, homework assistance, socialization and a special enrichment project. Parents can sign up for the entire year or for whatever makes sense for your schedules. We expect this class to take off once we get started , but you don’t have to wait. Please contact the School Office with questions or to sign up.

This one is just a teaser (we’ll see who’s paying attention!)…but our school is working behind the scenes with national foundations, grant-makers, day school networks, etc., with the goal of announcing our hosting of a 21st Century Learning Conference next year here at our own school! Stay tuned!

Our year will culminate, of course, in a once-in-a-generation celebration of our school’s 50th Anniversary! Blogs, announcements, committees, advertisements, etc., are all in the planning stages to ensure this event is everything our school and community deserve it to be. If you are interested in being involved (in any way!), please let us know. In the meanwhile, save the date for the weekend of May 4 – 6 as we celebrate the excellent 50 years that have been and prepare for the next trailblazing 50 years to come.

Wow. We’ve got a lot of excitement to come next year! Still sad about summer ending?

I’m off to New York City on Monday morning for a Schechter Day School Network Board Retreat. (I’ll be back Monday night – a nice perk of East Coast living!) I think I will turn my attention next week to discussing all matters Schechter. It has been a very interesting year and the Network has some exciting plans of its own…

An “Academy” Approach to Jewish Education

Transparency & Collaboration.

[No, it’s not the name of the next buddy cop or lawyer series with a summer premiere on TNT, TBS or USA. Although I’d probably watch it! “Coming this summer on TNT, he’s a wisecracking lawyer looking for a second chance; she’s a divorced mother of three looking to get back in the game – together they are cleaning up this town one case at a time: ‘Transparency & Collaboration’. Mondays at 9.”]

If I had to sum up our educational philosophy in just two words, it would be difficult to find two better words than those. I have written at length about both concepts in prior posts (you can check here, here and here for good examples). They encompass almost each facet of how we go about the business of teaching and learning. Whether we are talking classroom pedagogy or stakeholder communication; professional development or parent partnerships; student motivation or governance – it is difficult to imagine any component of schooling not improving with greater transparency and collaboration. We worked extremely hard last year to move down the path towards greater transparency and collaboration. The data we collected (surveys, testing, etc.) indicate significantly positive results. We took a step – we have many more steps to take. We are spending our summer preparing those next steps and I will blog about the new initiatives and programs to be undertaken next school year in the 50th anniversary year of the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School. But let’s readjust our focus back a few degrees to the macro. For transparency and collaboration cannot be hypocritically or artificially bound to the physical separation between school, shul and community. In order to gain the maximum leverage of human, physical and financial resources to provide the highest degree of excellence, it is useful to begin thinking about an “academy” approach to Jewish education. And we have.

Some background may prove useful to readers less familiar with our present model. (MJGDS stakeholders feel free to skip to the next paragraph!) Our day school is in the minority of Solomon Schechter Day Schools owned and operated by Conservative synagogues. (Fun fact: I’ve now headed two of them!) Our school is owned and operated by the Jacksonville Jewish Center. Like many synagogues, the Jacksonville Jewish Center operates a preschool (the JJC Preschool), a religious school (the Bernard & Alice Selevan Religious School), a [supplemental] high school (Makom), youth groups (USY) and even a summer day camp (Camp Ki Tov). Add the day school to the mix and you can see the extraordinary size and scope of educational programming currently in operation at the synagogue!

Having spent a year, I can say that we operate with a high degree of collegiality. The clergy, professionals and staff who work at the Center interact with respect and, when circumstance dictates, work together well. However, there is a big difference between collegiality and collaboration. “Collegiality” is an attitude; “Collaboration” is an approach. It is the difference between getting along with each other and realizing that you can’t get anywhere without each other. It is the difference between separate schools, camps and programs and an academy.

Over the next year, the lay leaders, professionals and clergy of the Jacksonville Jewish Center will be working together as a task force to create a vision to bring our formal and informal educational programs together into what we are calling the “academy”. It is a vision that calls for the tearing down of boundaries between our schools and programs in order to foster excellence in all. It is a vision that acknowledges that the Preschool can learn from the Day School and the Day School can learn from the Religious School and the Religious School can learn from USY. It is a vision that realizes that we are invested in each other’s success. It is a vision that has the courage to acknowledge that there are many paths in Jewish education and that our task is not to decide for a family which the right one(s) are, but to provide excellence in each for the good of our children and our community.

I am honored to be the professional charged with the task of guiding the task force in its work during the upcoming 2011-2012 school year. (I will be working with Mauri Mizrahi, the Center’s Vice President of Education, as the lay leader for the task force.) Our ambitious goal is for the academy to launch in the 2012-2013 school year. We are spending the summer reading books and articles on educational vision, team-building, Jewish education and the Jewish community so we can begin our work together with a shared vocabulary. For the sake of transparency, we may create some kind of an “Academy Blog” as a means of communicating the work of the task force with greater detail to its stakeholders than I would choose to share to this blog’s audience…or not. We’ll have to see as we move forward.

It is a very exciting process. Some of the advantages to operating in this mode are self-evident. But there will surely be many fascinating questions raised. You may be thinking about some of them right now. In future blog posts (here or elsewhere), I will try to address them. But let me address two right away:

1) Our school took a wonderful step last year. But it is just one step on a long journey. The work of the task force will not come on the back of my primary task, being Head of the Martin J. Gottleib Day School. I will have to carve out the time somewhere else and I will.

2) Positioning the MJGDS within an “academy” at the Jacksonville Jewish Center does not impact its JJC-centricity. The school has been owned and operated by the Center for 49 years – its ability to be a loving and welcoming place for all families regardless of affiliation has always been important and will continue to be important moving forward. Being part of an academy doesn’t make the school any more connected to the Center than it already is. It simply (overly-simply) opens up the school to even more resources and excellence already in play. As one example…if the Center’s USY chapter has excellence in team-building (and it does) we ought to employ those resources in our Middle School where team-building is paramount. It really is no different than the value-added of having the Center’s clergy play the important role in our school that they already do. We are simply extending the idea as far as it can fly for maximum benefit.

I look forward to sharing more with you as we begin our work. There are some similar models already in existence (Pressman Academy in Los Angeles for one), but not many. I’d love to hear from someone in a community operating with something similar, so feel free and send me a comment or a tweet. In the meanwhile, if you have any questions about the “academy”…please feel free and ask!

You Can Go Home Again

Forgive the brevity (for me)…

We got back late last night from a week-long vacation in Las Vegas and we are moving rental homes first thing Monday morning. Between catching up at school and prepping for the move…

It was our first trip back to Las Vegas, our most recent home, after almost an entire full year here in Jacksonville, our new home. As the plane was descending into Las Vegas, I was reminded of one those “only in Vegas” phenomena that I was finally on the right side of. Living in Las Vegas and traveling for work was a singularly annoying activity because only in Las Vegas does everyone applaud when the plane lands. You are simply returning home to your workaday life, but you are surrounded by people filled with desperate longing for the vacation of a lifetime. Cities like Las Vegas, Los Angeles and Miami are fascinating to work in because people move there to be on permanent vacation – there is a different mindset and a different energy. Anyhoo, last week, at least, we were happily clapping along with the rest of the vacationers.

I have written a lot (for 11 months of weekly blog posts) about my personal Jewish journey, but very little about my professional Jewish journey. That hasn’t been for any reason other than I don’t expect there is much interest in my prior stops for my present, primary audience – stakeholders for the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School. As I have eased my way into the blogosphere, I have felt more comfortable occasionally blurring the lines between the personal and the professional, although always cognizant that this is a professional blog. I try to write in my own voice and with my own particular sense of humor. I try to share the things that I am thinking about and, thus, make my private process public. And sometimes I share something personal when I am so moved because that’s how I understand the meaning of authenticity. Consider me so moved (and so jet-lagged).

This was, as I have said, my first trip back to Las Vegas since we moved to Jacksonville last summer. In addition to having an opportunity to visit my parents, it was our first opportunity to return to the school I had the honor of helping create as its founding head. Almost six years ago, with a two-week old daughter in tow, we landed in Las Vegas to begin what turned out to be an extraordinary five-year adventure in almost every sense of the world. There is little doubt that when, years later, I revisit the twists and turns of my professional career, my five years as founding head of the Solomon Schechter Day School of Las Vegas will stand out as uniquely fork-turning.

This is not a picture from my Bar Mitzvah – it is from my second year in Las Vegas during Simchat Torah. Ah…how young we all were once!

It was wonderful to have an opportunity to visit my former school and even though school was already out, we got to see teachers, parents, and many friends on our trip. Maytal, our three year-old, didn’t really recognize her teachers from last year, but Eliana, our almost-six year-old, got to visit with almost all the teachers she had had from eighteen months on. It was very intense walking through the doors of a place you had spent so much time and energy, but no longer belong to. Part of me felt like I had never left; part of me felt like I had never been. A colleague put it in perspective by reminding me that although the past year changed everything for me, for those still there…

By my third year, I used to tell the story of how during my first year, when we gathered as a school we took up less than one row of the Main Sanctuary. 14 First & Second Graders. By my fourth year…

…our first graduating class – almost as many students as we had to begin with.

The full story of that school’s creation is one that I am more than just personally interested in; it is the subject of my doctoral dissertation. I am heading round the final turn entering my ninth (!) and final year as a doctoral student in the Davidson Graduate School of Jewish Education at the Jewish Theological Seminary. Trying to write a doctoral dissertation while founding a new school, raising two young daughters, and then relocating cross-country for an amazing job opportunity is probably not the textbook move, but life rarely goes according to plan. I mention all of this because the story of my time in Las Vegas and the (professional) lessons to be learned from it is nearly written and will be available in one form or another for those interested sooner than later. I’ll have more to say as publication looms closer.

In the meanwhile, it was good to know that Las Vegas will continue to be a home of sorts for our family. It was good to see my parents. It was wonderful to see our old friends. It was fun to be back in Las Vegas. It was dangerous to eat so much kosher meat. It was satisfying to see the school I helped found doing so well under the tried and true stewardship of others. We will surely be back for future visits. But as our plane descended last night into Jacksonville, I must say that, in my mind, I quietly applauded.

It is good to be home.

Self-Evaluation – The Ultimate Transparency

We had our final meeting of teachers and staff this morning to officially wrap up the 2010-2011 school year! Woo-hoo! School’s out…for summer!

But before we turn the page entirely on the year that was AND before we share some of the “Coming Attractions” for 2011-2012 (an upcoming, post-vacation blog post!), I thought I would take a final stab at transparency and share a reflection of how I thought I did this year in my first year as Head of the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School. [I reflected last week (here) about my adventures in 21st century learning this past year, but that is only one aspect of my role as head of school.] What follows are actual excerpts from the self-evaluation I wrote and submitted to my “Head Support & Evaluation Subcommittee” as part of my overall evaluative process. We have asked all of our teachers to post reflections of their years on our (closed) ning as part of promoting the value of shared reflection. I want to do my part by sharing excerpts of my reflection for y’all (did that sound authentically southern enough? It has almost been a year!):

Jon’s Self-Evaluation “Students”:

I think in this area we took a number of important first steps this year. We created academic standards for each grade and subject by Winter Break and were able to disseminate benchmarks as part of the Admissions Process. We created and disseminated a variety of survey instruments, failing only to send out and score an “Alumni Survey” for this year’s freshman class.

We have also taken great strides in our outreach to special needs families and in our current practice in putting together processes for dealing with the mechanics of delivering services. We take it as a positive sign that KoleinuJax has gifted us (in collaboration with Jewish Family & Community Services and the Jewish Community Foundation of Northeast Florida) the monies necessary to expand our program next year by allowing us to hire and train additional support staff in classes where we have children with special needs.

One additional area I would like to improve upon for next year is my own personal investment in teaching and establishing relationships with students. I taught First Grade Tefillah once a week this year; I may expand upon that next year. I taught MS Tefillah once a week this year; I may seek to find additional opportunities to teach in the MS as well. I take it as a positive sign that students have been sending me letters, emails and making appointments to meet with me when they have questions and concerns, but I would like to do a better job next year of working on developing meaningful relationships with my students. It is a time management challenge (what isn’t!), but one worth solving.

Jon’s Self-Evaluation “Faculty”:

I think I have successfully implemented an evaluative process that has not been active in some number of years. I believe we have created an environment where teachers have reached the higher bar we have mutually set.

My takeaway from the survey data from the faculty is that I have room for growth in providing more regular positive feedback. I do not compliment as often as I would like to and because I am not shy about providing critique, it can create an imbalance. My experience is that in time as we all get to know each other better it becomes less and less of an issue, but that does not mean I shouldn’t try harder to provide positive reinforcement. Next year, I want to put up a bulletin board in the faculty room where we share positive thoughts with each other and then make it a personal goal to put one up a day. That will create good habits.

I also want to make more of an effort to spend more time developing personal relationships. It is so hard to find the time, but if I am serious about creating a family atmosphere it will be necessary.

We did a good job of providing professional development to our Jewish Studies Faculty. We have provided more opportunities for teachers to teach each other during our Faculty Meetings which are now hosted by a different teacher each month in her classroom and has a theme. I would like next year to try to send a few more teachers out to receive subject matter expertise that they can bring back – for example, Judy Reppert could attend a seminar and then lead a faculty meeting and share what she learned. I would like our MS Faculty to serve more as “department chairs” for the Lower School in their areas of expertise.

Jon’s Self-Evaluation “Parents”:

Teaching “Parent University” and establishing a blog were two big goals for this year. It takes a lot of time to keep up the weekly blogs and to prepare and teach the class, but it is worth it and then some. The twice-yearly face-to-face meetings with parents yielded vital information and hopefully positively contributed to retention.

I also think I’ll be able next year to expand my reach into Shabbat and holiday programming which will better foster the school-shul relationship and the kinds of meaningful carryover we are all looking for.

I think, similarly to faculty, I could do a better job with volunteer recognition and appreciation. I need to take the extra step to ensure that people feel appreciated for the volunteering they do. I try hard now, but I think I can grow in making sure people feel they have my full attention whenever we are speaking. My mind races a million miles an hour, but I don’t ever want a parent to feel that I am not keenly interested in their issue at the moment we are speaking.

So…that’s that! I hope having an opportunity to peek inside my process from time to time is useful; it is for me!

I told the teachers this morning that I am typically as excited about summer vacation as they are…but honestly? I am so enthusiastic about what is planned for next year that I almost wish we could skip to Pre-Planning…

Almost!