Todah! Thank you!

An open letter to the Machar community of Washington, DC:

I hope to use this blog to share more about our Jewish Cultural School in the future, but for my first post, I had something more important to say. 

Todah.  Thank you.

Todah for hiring me as the incoming Director for the Jewish Cultural School.  Todah for trusting me with your children, with hiring your children's teachers, and with your children's Jewish education.  Today, I especially want to say todah for sending me to NewCAJE -- the conference for Jewish Educators.  There, beyond the countless art project ideas, the lessons on managing staff, the classes on raising Jewish philanthropists, the sessions on running a school, I learned that experience means more than curriculum.

“I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” -- Maya Angelou 

The time together with other Jewish educators, just remembering my own Jewish education, allowed me to take that idea to heart, and learn how to better connect with our amazing team of teachers and show them how to better connect with our amazing group of students, who in turn will remind us how to better connect with our whole community.

Machar is one of the most beautiful places I've found in my life.  It's a place full of enlightened and intelligent people with compassion, tolerance, and kindness.  It's the place to raise your children if you care about humanity, dignity, and goodness; if you want our future generations to value service over self; if you believe in social justice for all.  Every month, there is at least one new way a member of our group is working to give, help, and advocate for others.  Before anything else, Machar is a community.

“How wonderful that no one need to wait a single moment to improve the world.” -- Anne Frank

I absolutely hope to instill Jewish secular humanistic values, cover the curriculum laid out by the Society for Humanistic Judaism and Machar, teach the Hebrew language, and have an activity for every Jewish holiday throughout the year ... BUT, before any of that takes place, I hope to share an experience, a feeling, and a sense of belonging that's beyond any book, any lesson, or any classroom... BECAUSE if our students feel good being a Jewish humanist, we will be creating lifelong Jewish humanists.

PLEASE attend in person our community meeting on Sunday, September 11, 2016 at 10 AM in the large assembly room, so I can say "Todah" in person and we can all share a unique Machar experience together.