Gatlinburg Shabbaton

Another set of unforgettable moments were created and forever forged in the memories of our high school boys this past shabbos in their annual Gatlinburg Shabbaton. Masterfully orchestrated by Rabbi Gersten, the weekend - whose theme was Emet vi-Sheker (Honesty and Deceit) - featured everything from simulated moral dillemas and stimulating text-based learning to inspiring ruach and insightful conversations, and from to time in town, time with friends, and time on the slopes, to the time-honored tradition of the CYHSB Polar Bear Club. There is nothing quite like it...

Shabbos Blogging

To all of my blog subscribers who have been wondering what siman in Shulchan Aruch allows me to blog on shabbos, let me put your mind at ease. The email which you receive telling you of an update to my blog, is automatically produced by a service called Feedburner and generally goes out 12 to 24 hours after I have posted an entry. As Fridays tend to offer me a few more free minutes to blog than do the other days of the week, the email from Feedburner alerting you of an update often goes out once shabbos has started - hence the appearance that I am blogging between aliyos or during the rabbi's speech. Please rest assured, though, that I am not.

Picturing America

Thanks to the efforts of our middle and high school history teacher Dr. Whitney Kennon, MHA/FYOS has been selected to be a recipient of the Picturing America grant sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities. The Picturing America program seeks to educate students by providing large, high quality reproductions of American art for display in classrooms. These works of art help enhance the learning process by serving as visual stimulation, and creating a more enjoyable learning environment.

Here's a quote form Dr. Kennon: "I am very excited about this wonderful opportunity for our school. This collection has some of the most famous and memorable images from American history and will be useful not only in the classroom but will also complement the growing collection of wonderful art which graces our hallways."

To see some of the art, click here.

Geography Bee

4th through 8th grade competed in the National Geographic Society's nation-wide geography bee. Each class in grades 4-8 first held their own class-wide competition. The top two qualifiers then represented the class in the school-wide competition live competition on Wednesday. In an exciting duel, 8th grader Lee Silberberg edged out 7th grader Hannah Leigh Morris for the victory. Lee will now take the written qualifying test to secure entry into the state competition. Good luck, Lee! Make us proud!

Our Hearts Are in the East

While we, like Yehudah HaLevi a millennium ago, are at the edge of the West, we have made it a priority to ensure that our students hearts' are firmly planted in the East. From daily news reports and educational assemblies, to extra tefillot and letter-writing campaigns, students in all grades have been keeping abreast of the situation in Israel, learning about its complexities, and empathizing with its tragedies. May we soon see enduring peace.

"Firsts" for the Dean's Writing Award

The results are in from December's Dean's Writing Award. This month's submissions were amongst the best I've gotten yet and featured two new "firsts". It was the first time we received two full length essays written completely in Hebrew, as well as the first time we received a submission from Kindergarten! In fact, the competition was so stiff for the Judaic Studies category, that I had to give two awards instead of one. So... the winners of the December Dean's Writing Contest in the Judaic Studies category were David Finkelstein (our Kindergartner!) and Jake Baum. In the General Studies category, the winner was David Yehoshua Samuels.

To see the complete list of nominees and to read the work of our finalists and winners, click here.

Names, Not Numbers in the Commercial Appeal

Earlier in the month I blogged about the Names, Not Numbers program for which our seniors were conducting and filming interviews with survivors of the Holocaust. The Commercial Appeal had sent a reporter to the school during the filming, and her article was in today's paper (Dec 30). In the print version the article titled "Project Puts Names to Holocaust Survivors" appears on the first page of the second section, and online the article can be found here or by searching for 'margolin' on the CA's webpage.

Congratulations to Rabbi Gersten and our high school seniors for their hard work on this important project.

Color War

As a surprise for the students, Color War, traditionally held in the beginning of June, was moved to Monday, December 22nd. Some early concerns that Color War just wouldn't be the same without outdoor activities quickly proved to be unfounded. Coach Carr made sure to keep everyone busy playing spirited games of basketball and kickball in the gym all morning, with a showcase basketball game featuring 5th-8th grade boys in the afternoon. Loud and enthusiastic cheers could be heard from various parts of the elementary school all day long as team Red and Black and team Blue and White tried to show who was best. The lunchroom was the site of many entertaining relay races, often with hula hoops or balls, all designed to encourage team cooperation and spirit. The day cumulated in a presentation ceremony in the gym, with each team showing off a beautiful handmade banner, acting out a funny skit, and singing several songs and cheers. After the final point tally team Red and Black was declared the winner by a very slim margin, but judging by the smiles on the children's faces, there were clearly no losers when it came to Color War.

Champions

The 2nd Annual Cooper Invitational Tournament was an unprecedented success. Conceived and implemented by Coach Josh Kahane, it surpassed anyone's wildest expectations and brought national attention to our school, our boys, and our community. The fact that our Cooper Macs landed up defeating several larger schools and winning the tournament championship was but a small part of what made the weekend so special.

On behalf of the school, I wanted to express my deepest gratitude to Josh and his assistant Jonathan Wogan for the hours upon hours of selfless work they devoted to this event. Their commitment to our school and its vision of growth should be an inspiration and motivation for us all.

Chanukah

Nothing brings our school to life quite like Chanukah. Click below for a quick glimpse into the myriad of programs, events, and festivities that have permeated our classrooms and hallways over the past few days...

November Winners

The winners of November's Dean's writing award give us a glimpse into two less common areas of student writing. In the non-Judaic category, we had a tie between 1st graders Esti Samberg and Racheli Perl. In their terrific paragraphs we see how our earliest writers are learning to express their emotions and offer detailed descriptions through the written word. In the Judaic category, the winning piece was a work of historical fiction by 10th grader Maddie Tavin who put herself into the world of an early traveler to pre-modern Israel.

Please visit our Writing Award wikispace to read their excellent work.

It's Tournament Time!

The 2nd Annual Cooper Invitational Tournament is set to begin this Thursday evening at MJCC. Beginning this afternoon, eight boys high school basketball teams from Jewish day schools across the country will descend on our community for a weekend of competition, camaraderie, and fun. Our own Cooper Macs are off to a great start this season, but they are counting on strong fan support to propel them through the tournament. So, clear your calendar for the weekend and plan on being at the JCC to cheer our guys on!

You can find a schedule of all of the events on the official tournament website. And, for those, who simply can not make it to the games - fear not! You can listen to them on webiste's live webcast.

Thank you Coach Kahane for putting it all together and best of luck to all!!

Powerful Preview

Words can hardly describe the educational experience our 12th graders have had this week as they conducted their interviews for the Names, Not Numbers program. From Auschwitz survivors to a Dachau liberator and a partisan fighter, the stories our students uncovered, documented, and preserved defy description. Instead, I offer you three things:

First is a behind the scenes preview of the type of content you can expect from the videos they are making. It is a small clip I have posted of our girls interviewing Mr. Weinreich, which only begins to scratch the surface of his incredible tale.

Second is a suggestion to keep your eyes out for an article on our students and their project in an upcoming edition of the Commercial Appeal.

Last, is a date: Tuesday evening, March 17. That is when we will hold our public showing of the documentary that award winning videographer, Mr. Eric Spaar, is making about our students and the work they will have by then completed. So, save the date. It's not something you'll want to miss.

Steak Dinner 08

I wonder how many schools in the world (other than our Girls School) have something quite like our Boys High School Steak Dinner. How many other schools have an event in which every single student voluntarily devotes hours upon hours to inviting community members, purchasing supplies, cooking, setting up, serving, and cleaning up? Even if there was another, what are the chances that the food they cooked would actually be worth paying for? How many other boys high schools have an event in which students spend months filming and editing a video which was hysterically funny yet completely clean and tasteful? Better yet, how many boys high schools would use such an event and such a video each and every year to express heartfelt gratitude to one of their teachers? And how many schools of 35 boys could get 300 people out to support them? I have a feeling there aren't too many.

Thank you Rabbi Gersten, and a job very well done guys. You should all be proud.

Friday Tisching

The smell of chulent, the sounds of the guitar, flute, and 35 boys singing at the top of their lungs, topped off by inspiring divrei chizuk, could only mean one thing... another CYHSB Friday morning tisch.

MHA Art Gets a Virtual Home

I am thrilled to tell you that Mrs. Chany Fleischhacker has become the third MHA faculty member to join the blogosphere this year. Her blog, called The Art Beat of MHA, is intended to keep the universe informed of all of the wonderful things our children are learning and creating in our Lower School Art program. With a simple click of the mouse you'll see that Mrs. Fleischhacker has already posted all sorts of great content related to the Art program to her site. It took me almost a year to post a video to my blog and she has one there on the very first day!

I'm going to add a feed from her blog to my blog list (in the lower right hand corner of this site) so that we can all keep tabs on her site as it continues to grow.

Thank you Mrs. Fleischhacker and welcome to the wonderful world of blogging!

Take Your Children Here

As I noted in this week's newsletter message, the vast number of enriching opportunities which the internet provides us all is matched only by the growing number of avenues for potential harm it presents. For a staggering number of recent statistics related to internet safety for children visit the statistics page of the site called Enough is Enough. For the article from the journal Pediatrics referenced in the newsletter message click here. For an important article recently published in Principal Leadership on cyberbullying, click here.

While nothing is foolproof, I want to encourage parents of children in grades 1-5 to take their children to the NetSmartzKids website and to spend some time exploring it together. You might want to start with this introduction the Webville Outlaws and then let your children play the games and other activities that will reinforce what they have learned.

The more we talk to our children about safe and appropriate internet practice and the earlier we do so, the greater the chances that they will become responsible members of the cyber generation rather than its predators or prey.

Dean's Writing Awards

The winning submissions for October's Dean's Writing Award are absolute must reads. 11th grader Ariav Schlesinger's sonnet on faith will blow you away in its profundity and depth, not to mention his careful adherence to authentic sonnet form. When your serious moment is over, though, be sure to read 5th grader Nachi Fleischhaker's "Room of Doom." It will have you rolling on the floor in laughter.

To see the list of all of this month's nominees and to read the work of our finalists and winners, click here for our Dean's Writing Award wikispace.

High School Open House

The high schools put their best foot forward last night with an informative and enjoyable Open House. Student speakers Avi Katz and Jordana Wender demonstrated in both form and substance what remarkable young men and women our schools produces. Dr. Ellen Stecker, mother of three current high school students, offered a parent's perspective on the unique blend of variety in curricular and extra-curricular offerings coupled with individualized attention and small class sizes, that our schools offer. I then gave a more macrocosmic view of our school's mission and offered a portrait of graduate which you can find in the Message from the Dean in this week's newsletter, which was then followed by a student made video.

Following the video our parents and students split up. Our parents were treated to mini-presentations from representative members of our faculty who gave them a taste for what class is like both at the CYSHB and the GMSG. The kids went off to hear about our extra-curriculars, athletics, electives, and leadership opportunities. After the presentations were finished the parents and students switched places so as to hear the other set of presentations. The night ended with a presentation from Rabbi Spodek to the parents interested in the Boys School and one from Mrs. Kampf to the parents interested in the Girls School about the unique characteristics of their respective programs.

From the feedback we received it was clear that parents and students alike had learned quite a bit about our program and that the excitement to be part of our high school programs is continuing to grow.

Fall Festival

Our first annual Fall Festival was exactly what we had hoped it would be. The beautifully decorated Fall themed hallways led visitors to classrooms where teachers were waiting to engage children in activities ranging from story-telling to art projects done in Hebrew. The lunchroom was alive with Jewish books and games for sale, labels for children clothing and ladies' hats. The gym was all decked out with bales of hay, balloons, and fall colored tables, where children and parents alike made Fall crowns, decorated Fall shaped cookies, lined up for their favorite creation from the one and only Balloon Guy, or headed to the Food corner for lunch or a snack. Right outside the doors of the gym, the Kollel Torah MiTzion was showing off their wide array of programing and their incredible musical talent. Just beyond the Kollel was Farmer Steve in his overalls and straw hat, taking children on hay rides around the ponies, moon bounce, and inflatable slide which filled our field.

At the designated times, parents who were interested in learning more about the innovative curricula and new initiatives now underway in the Academy had two options for doing so. They could head to our Kindergarten classroom to hear from our new Early Childhood Director, Mrs. Charna Schubert, about our up and coming Pre-K through Kindergarten program, or to our First Grade classroom to hear both from Mrs. Brittney Friedman, our new First Grade General Studies teacher, and Morah Chavi Katz, our much beloved First Grade Judaic Studies teacher, about all of the exciting things happening in First Grade. And, much to our delight, parents - both long time Academy parents and many who were visiting for their very first time - took the opportunity to do so.

Everywhere you went there were parent volunteers greeting you with a smile and a helping hand. Everywhere you went there were children laughing, parents talking, and a good time being had by all.

Time to start planning the 2nd annual MHA Fall Festival...