Participants at the recently concluded North American Jewish Day School Leadership Conference are hailing it as having been a unique and invaluable opportunity to share perspectives and explore common issues in an environment of denominational unity.
The conference brought together nearly 600 leaders and educators at Jewish day schools from across the U.S. and Canada, representing the full spectrum of denominational approaches to day school education.
“This conference was a remarkable opportunity to network with and learn from others who operate in day schools in entirely different settings, and we proved we can still teach each other an immense amount,” said Eric Petersiel, Head of School at the Leo Baeck Day School in Ontario. “Our field is too small for us to separate ourselves. This gathering allowed for a true collection and sharing of information, knowledge and ideas that is quite powerful.”
In a groundbreaking collaboration, the Reform, Conservative, Orthodox and Community day school networks joined forces to organize the conference, recognizing the power of the collective during a time of both challenges and opportunities.
The conference was a joint initiative of RAVSAK: The Jewish Community Day School Network, the Institute for University-School Partnership at Yeshiva University, the Solomon Schechter Day School Association and PARDeS: The Progressive Association of Reform Day Schools.
The three-day conference, Thriving in a New Reality, addressed common concerns and issues as Jewish day schools enter a new decade committed to transmitting Jewish knowledge, enhancing Jewish practice, ensuring a vibrant Jewish future and solidifying the foundation of Jewish day school education.
Building on the conference theme, four plenary sessions and more than 60 sessions and workshops focused on 21st century challenges including the economy, government funding, demographic changes and teacher retention, and opportunities such as the promise of technology in classrooms, Jewish service learning and social media to build educational communities.
Such challenges and opportunities cut across Jewish educational denominations, and the opportunity to explore and discuss them made such a breakthrough collaborative conference invaluable, participants said, citing the new perspectives offered by educational leaders from other movements.
“Not only did this collaboration broaden and elevate the conversation here, but the joining of educators from different ideologies was inspirational and beneficial and a long time in coming,” said Nellie Harris, Upper School Principal at the Solomon Schechter Day School of Westchester. “Jewish educators and practitioners often have to go elsewhere to gain ideas, meet colleagues, learn about best practices and discuss big ideas. But this conference gave us the opportunity to do that, within a context of Jewish education in all of its forms and ideologies. I am walking away filled with ideas to consider and share with my colleagues and my community.”
Four dynamic plenary sessions during the conference featured some of the most innovative and forward thinkers in Jewish education and organization leadership. They included Dr. Alan November, Senior Partner at November Learning, on “Transformational Leadership,” Dr. Erica Brown, Director of Adult Education at The Partnership for Jewish Life and Learning, on “Tradition and Innovation: Leading as a Balancing Act,” Dr. Lee Shulman, President Emeritus of The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, on “Where Novelty and Routine Collide: From the Formation of Understanding to the Formation of Identity in the Process of Education,” and author Jonah Lehrer on “How We Decide: The New Science of Decision Making.”
“Even though we are from other denominations, most of what we are doing is the same, educating Jewish children and building the Jewish future,” said Rabbi Chaim Hagler, Principal of Yeshivat Noam in Paramus, NJ. “We learned a lot from each other, as we are all dealing with the same issues that are common across the entire spectrum.”
The North American Jewish Day School Leadership Conference was sponsored by The Covenant Foundation, the Partnership for Excellence in Jewish Education, The Kohelet Foundation and several anonymous funders.
“That professional and lay leadership from across the Jewish spectrum learned, shared and prayed together - that we wrestled with best practices and visions of Jewish education together – those were the most powerful takeaway moments of this conference,” said Jerry D. Isaak-Shapiro, Head of School at The Agnon School in Beachwood, OH. “The diverse environment and the fact that we were all there for shared objectives and in an atmosphere of common values transformed workshops and keynote addresses into something far more important than the usual conference fare. Clal Yisrael and Ahavat Yisrael – the unity of the Jewish People and love of Zion – weren’t just catchphrases in our respective mission statements. They were blueprints for how to focus on what’s truly important.”
Pictures from the conference, which took place Jan. 17 to 19 in Teaneck, NJ, are posted at http://www.jewishdayschoolconference.org.
CAT, RAVSAK’s online, highly participatory middle school program in Jewish history, will have four new schools taking part in the fall:
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