Below is an edited version of an article that first appeared in the Winter 2011 issue of Stanford Social Innovation Review. The full version can be found at www.ssir.org.
Prizmah represents a collaboration of colleagues from five legacy organizations, so collaboration is a natural theme for this first Prizmah issue of HaYidion. Articles demonstrate an eagerness to embrace new educational paradigms, to rethink the foundations of day school education, to dream big and do the patient work to follow through. The writers here evince several principles in action: a willingness to take risks; acknowledging and defying challenges; thinking holistically/globally; and connecting or smashing silos.
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Below is an edited version of an article that first appeared in the Winter 2011 issue of Stanford Social Innovation Review. The full version can be found at www.ssir.org.
Jewish day schools claim that they offer the best of both worlds: a stellar secular academic education combined with a meaningful and intellectual Jewish education. However, at many schools those two educational tracks often operate independently of one another. Two separate faculties, separate learning blocks, separate staff meetings, separate educational goals and sometimes even separate classrooms. Two parallel lines stretching out next to each other, never intersecting. But what if they did? What if we made the intersection the founding principle of our schools?
The sine qua non for a Jewish school’s functional governance lies in creating an effective partnership between the institution’s professional administration and its lay leadership. Choose virtually any of the array of consultants to make a presentation to your board and you are guaranteed to spend a major chunk of time discussing this axiom. Board manuals for Jewish schools across the country should include a preprinted page with the concept emblazoned in bold letters.
Dear friends,
I am delighted to be writing to you in this space as the founding board chair of Prizmah: Center for Jewish Day Schools. It is my honor to share with you the vision and the values that guide our work, and my own story of how day schools have transformed me and my family.
Welcome to “Innovation Alley”! It is my great honor and pleasure to join the HaYidion team wearing my new Prizmah innovation hat. My goals for this column—part of a larger strategy for showcasing, sharing, and introducing innovation for the field—are threefold: 1) Share a new idea. 2) Provide a concrete example. 3) Issue a charge.
What’s the big idea?
In April 2016, Krieger Schechter Day School (KSDS) and The Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore’s Center for Jewish Camping (CJC) partnered with five overnight camps, hosting the first annual Camp@School Day. (School staff captured this day on video: tinyurl.com/jboeaxt.) KSDS students and faculty were introduced to a variety of local area Jewish overnight camps as they participated in engaging, meaningful and informal Jewish educational experiences.
Two are better off than one, for they have greater wages from their labor. … A threefold cord is not quickly broken. (Kohelet 4:9, 12)
In the telling and retelling of the building of the Mishkan through the book of Shmot, there is much to learn about how Bnei Yisrael succeeded in this great endeavor, amidst so much detail about the architecture and contents. Hashem says that “every man whose heart makes him willing” is to be part of the work.
כּׂל הַעוֹלָם כֻּלוֹ גֶשֶׁר צָר מְאֹד וְהַעִקָר לׂא לְפַחֵד כְּלָל.
All the world is a narrow bridge, and the most important thing is not to fear at all.
Jewish day schools that reside in small communities face challenges not often shared by larger schools in larger communities. Among these challenges are isolation from other Jewish day schools, small school populations, and limited resources, both financial and human. A group of six heads of school from small communities—Debra Abolafia from the N.E.
The Ideal Team Player: How to Recognize and Cultivate The Three Essential Virtues, by Patrick Lencioni
“Therefore, it is key that leaders demonstrate restraint when their people engage in conflict, and allow resolution to occur naturally, as messy as it can sometimes be. This can be a challenge because many leaders feel that they are somehow failing in their jobs by losing control of their teams during conflict. Finally, as trite as it may sound, a leader’s ability to personally model appropriate conflict behavior is essential. By avoiding conflict when it is necessary and productive—something many executives do—a team leader will encourage this dysfunction to thrive.”
Q: What is best practice when it comes to setting tuition?
Chicago’s Jewish day schools thrive due to the power of collaboration: among schools; among local funders; between federation, schools, and funders; and between local and national funders.
Day schools sit at the center of a thriving ecosystem of valuable Jewish organizations, with the latter—Jewish summer camps, the home, youth groups, campus Hillels, UJA and Israel—surrounding and enveloping the school. “Spokes” of influence connect the day school hub to each organization, in a bidirectional symbiotic relationship (and as the graphic shows, each institution on the periphery impacts one another as well). To magnify and maximize the effectiveness of day schools, day school leaders would be wise to collaborate with organizations that share their Jewish mission.
This article highlights five lessons for those who seek to develop communitywide collaborations to support day school professional development. The New Jersey Quest for Teaching Excellence Program was founded in 2011 in the belief that excellent teachers are needed to build excellent schools, and that teacher excellence is best cultivated through communitywide collaboration. Each of four partner schools was tasked with establishing its own robust professional development plan driven by the individualized needs of teachers and overseen by a part-time faculty dean.