Ocotober 18, 2019 | 19 Tishrei 5780
NOTEWORTHY LOCAL Holocaust survivors speak out
Candlelighting 6:18 p.m. | Havdalah 7:15 p.m. | Vol. 62, No. 42 | pittsburghjewishchronicle.org
Israeli teachers arrive for educational seminar
Local film screening will benefit three synagogues attacked on Oct. 27, 2018.
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Classrooms Without Borders, and Israel’s Ministry of Education, and together they created the Israel-Pittsburgh Joint Teachers Seminar, with the goal of getting teachers out of their usual environments. “Sometimes they don’t get to observe other classrooms, even the ones next to them,” said Inbar. The Israel-Pittsburgh Joint Teachers Seminar is an opportunity to not only watch other teachers, Inbar explained, but to work with them. The current group of Israeli teachers have already spent months communicating online. Now, spending time in the physical presence of American teachers and students should “give a different perspective,” said Gur. The seminar will place the eight teachers with American counterparts in four local high schools — Pittsburgh Allderdice, Shaler Area, Avonworth and Winchester Thurston — where they’ll co-teach classes on racism, the Holocaust and anti-Semitism. The engagement will afford greater opportunity for “real life experience,” said Inbar. Whether it means Israeli teachers will better
or close to three decades, Rabbi Moishe Mayir Vogel has worked to support Jews in local, state and federal prisons throughout the Northeast. Vogel is the executive director of the Aleph Institute’s North East Region, ”stretching north from Virginia and East from Ohio.” According to Vogel, Pittsburgh has more federal prisons in a four-hour radius than anywhere else in the country. The Aleph Institute provides for Jewish inmates’ spiritual, educational, religious and advocacy needs, regardless of belief or denomination. Vogel recalls that when he began his tenure as executive director, he used to put up to 60,000 miles on his car each year, traveling from prison to prison throughout the region. Now, the Aleph Institute relies on a team of volunteers, including nine rabbis who have a goal of seeing each Jewish inmate at least once a week. Allegheny County has five to 10 Jews in prison at any given time. “With approximately 50,000 arrests in Allegheny County a year, and a jail that hold 3,000 inmates, turnover is very high,” Vogel said. “The average stay is three months. Because of the fast turnover, we’ve got to have people there at least once a week. With volunteers, we’re covering that. People come, people go, some people stay a little longer. We’re able to provide for them.” Providing for prisoners’ needs doesn’t simply mean arranging for a robust Torah study program or basic religious supplies like tefillin or matzah for Passover. It’s also about education. “One of the things we realized we needed from day one was a library,” he said. “The inmates have a lot of time. They want to
Please see Seminar, page 14
Please see Aleph, page 14
LOCAL Fighting for gender equality Israeli expert Dana Myrtenbaum visits Pittsburgh Ran Inbar, right, greets the Israeli teachers upon their arrival to Pittsburgh. Photo courtesy of Ran Inbar
By Adam Reinherz | Staff Writer
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WORLD Jewish community growth
New study shows population has increased by 10% in last seven years. Page 9
Aleph Institute provides for more than prisoners’ spiritual needs By David Rullo | Staff Writer
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ight Israeli teachers have come to Pittsburgh for pedagogical instruction. The hope is that they leave with a renewed purpose. Between Oct. 11 and Oct. 20, the Israeli delegation will partner with local educators to explore best practices in teaching about racism, anti-Semitism and the Holocaust. Ran Inbar, of Classrooms Without Borders, was spurred to organize the visit following the shooting at the Tree of Life building on Oct. 27, 2018, which came just two months after he’d arrived in Pittsburgh with his wife, who is completing a postdoc at Carnegie Mellon University. “The first thought was, ‘Let’s go home, there is no anti-Semitism there. There are many other problems, but no anti-Semitism.’ Then the second thought was, ‘No, let’s do something here that can make a difference,’” said Inbar, who’d been a history and civics teacher and vice principal of a school near Tel Aviv. “I thought about how can we make a difference. And the one place where you can really make a difference is education.” Inbar reached out to Tsipy Gur, of
Chabad House on Campus will honor University of Pittsburgh Chancellor Patrick Gallagher on October 26 during Homecoming Weekend. See ad on page 4.