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December 24, 2021 | 20 Tevet 5782

Candlelighting 4:41 p.m. | Havdalah 5:44 p.m. | Vol. 64, No. 52 | pittsburghjewishchronicle.org

Community Day School marks golden jubilee

NOTEWORTHY LOCAL Revamping teen education

Local college students face varying degrees of antisemitism on campus

The Pittsburgh Press (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) · Mon, Sep 10, 1973 · Main Edition · Page 10

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LOCAL The grit of Randy Boswell

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Locals share what they learned during a tough year

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The Pittsburgh Press (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) · Wed, Dec 19, 1990 · Main Edition · Page 51

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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) · Thu, Mar 9, 1989 · Final Edition · Page 99 Downloaded on Oct 1, 2016

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organized Community CDS was located at 6401 Forbes Avenue (corner of Forbes and Denniston) Day School as an nondenominational Jewish day Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) · Fri, May 9, 2008 · Page 20

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.  Images from prior decades: row, 1970s; second row, 1980s; third row, 1990s; , e ..Top rally in th g mo School oolbottom row, 2010s rld.” fourth row, 2000s; and Photos courtesy of Community h actin hDay c S e wo hanukkah (Marci Caplan) ally, y Copyright © 2016 Newspapers.com. All Rights Reserved.

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Second through fifth graders directed tzedaka contributions to Mollie’s Meals as part of their High Holiday Studies. From left: Rebecca Tanner, Bayla Butler (Mollie’s Meals), Eli Labelle, Frank Smizik (principal), Mollie Kaufer

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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) · Thu, Dec 1, 1983 · Page 99

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being a mom-and-pop type school.” Weinstein said the break was necessary t’s not often that a 30-year-old institution so parents would think about CDS the more bingokid talent show parent decides to change its structure, rewrite its same way they did other respected private bylaws, find a new board and hire a new institutions in town, including Shady Side chief executive officer — but that is exactly Academy and Winchester Thurston School. what Community Day School did in 2002. Founded in 1972 as a non-denominational With Dr. Lois Weinstein at the helm, the private Jewish day school for students in Developments & Fun Facts leaders of the Jewish private Key school decided kindergarten through third grade, the school it was time to leaveNight itsat thepartnership with the added one grade level each year for the next movies Jewish Education Institute (JEI) and return five years until it capped out at eighth grade. recipesThe to its roots as an independent entity. In 1988, CDS had an enrollment of 77 separation was completed on JuneClipped 23,By:2004. students. It added nearly half as many when Cultures Key Developments & Fun Facts That decision launched a new era it merged with the South Hills Solomon for CDS, which is celebrating its 50th Schechter School, swelling the number of students enrolled to 107. Three years later, anniversary in 2022. “It was important educationally, it was the school became part of the JEI. Ronna Harris Askin was board chair important from a financial standpoint, for of Solomon Schechter, housed at Beth the health of the school to break it apart,” Key Developments & Fun Facts El Congregation of the South Hills. She Weinstein said. “The school needed to be totally independent. We needed to control our own finances and destiny. It had outgrown Please see CDS, page 14

ByCDavid Rullo | Staff Writer

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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) · Thu, Jan 19, 2012 · [First Edition] · Page 75

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Not even a serious fall can keep him down

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Community Day School traces its roots to 1972, with the formation of its steering committee. Founders planned an independent, co-educational, inter-idealogical day school. Door opened in September 1973. The school started with only ten children in a combination of kindergarten and first grade classroom. Their teacher was Mrs. Tucker.

The first Officers of the school Board included JoAnne Talenfeld, president; Claire Klein, vice president; Allan Zytnick, vice president; Bernard Bauer, secretary; Bonnie Theiner, recording secretary; Dorothy ChairsLipsitz, of the Community Day Podolsky, financial secretary; Helen Noble treasurer; Michael Hourvitz; assistant treasurer. Members of the Board of Directors included Solomon Abrams, J. Philip Bromberg, David Chamovitz, School’s benefit Kathy Lutins, Ellen Weiss Kander, and RhondaSylvia Freedel, Ram Kossowsky, Harriet Kruman, Lois Lebovitz, Herman Lipsitz, Jack A. Meyers, Max Podolsky, Frank Jacob Davis, David A. Dinkin, Gloria Elbling, Paul Foreman, Horvitz and the SouthSide Works Cinema for “Night at the Movies” Sadofsky, Kurt C. Schreiber, Harry P. Sisser, Albert Smolover, Sam Steinberg, Micha Theiner, and Cyril H.Wecht. Rabbis Abraham Garmaize, Moshe V. Goldblum, Aaron Ilson, Wednesday. County Executive Dan Onorato was honored. Freedman performs with the Drum Walter Jacob, Alex Kaminetsky, Solomon Kaplan, Pincus F. Miller, Kenneth Segel, and Leonard WinogradAri served as advisors. Olam Ensemble from Community Day

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ndrew Cole recently experienced two instances of antisemitism. The first one wasn’t intended for his ears. The second one was. Before recounting the events, Cole, a 20-year-old sophomore at the University of Pittsburgh, said he needed space. He walked a few feet away, paused and explained how he grew up in Ridgewood, New Jersey, a place where he could count the number of Jewish classmates on his hands. High school was only a couple years ago but a lot has changed, he said. There was a pandemic, students were sent home from college and classes went virtual. Cole missed the lecture halls where professors spoke about American history or urban development. He longed to be with his friends, like those he met while playing a giant dreidel game on Chanukah. As spring semester 2020 rolled along in a virtual world, Cole realized he was struggling. He finished the term, then took a gap year and worked on farms across the country before returning to Oakland this semester for in-person classes. Something is different now, he said, and maybe that’s the reason why the first incident was so disturbing. It happened during a gaming session. Cole wasn’t playing, but heard one of the participants tell a fellow player to “Quit being so Jewish.” Cole thinks the comment was made in the context of a trade. He also doesn’t think it would have been uttered if his presence had been noticed — and that might be the most hurtful part about it, he said. “I don’t even think he considered me whatsoever, which kind of felt worse because it made me feel like I didn’t even

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The Pittsburgh Press (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) · Thu, Dec 20, 1973 · Main Edition · Page 2

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School in Squirrel Hill.

Under the leadership of the school’s first principal, Jackie Tucker, one grade was added each year through 8th grade.

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The school was located in the Hebrew Institute Building on the corner of Forbes Avenue and Denniston Hill. Students and teachers walked from Denniston ldtbaum Avenue to the JCC for gym classes. CDS graduated its first class of eighth graders in 1981. Sat, Oct 1, 2016 Clipped By: Copyright © 2017 Newspapers.com. All Rights Reserved. Round Hill Farm field trips, Friday all-school Shabbat, and Zimriah — all traditions that began in the 70s and continue today. Also in 1981, CDS’s board of Directors announced the first community campaign of the school; its goal was to raise $1000,000 over a three-year period. ldtbaum Sat, Oct 1, 2016

By 1983 the school, which had started as a “one room schoolhouse,” filled all of the classrooms in the Hebrew Institute Building (corner of Forbes and Denniston); it used an annex building for art and music Copyright © added. 2016 Newspapers.com. All Rights Reserved. classes. Trailers were soon added for extra classroom space, and a Science Lab was Copyright 2016 Newspapers.com. All Rights Reserved. CDS expanded the kindergarten and first grade© programs in the early 1980s, adding a second classroom to each.

CDS sponsored a float for the Israeli day parade on Forbes Avenue in the 1980s. The whole school fit onto one float. The first Eighth grade trip to Israel took place in March 1986.

Natalie Berman became the second principal of the school in the fall of 1986.

In 1988, CDS (with an enrollment of 77 students) merged with South Hills Solomon Schechter School, which had 30 students. In 1991, the school became part of the Jewish Education Institute (JEI), a citywide umbrella agency for Jewish education.

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There was tremendous growth during the 90s and enrollment capped at more than 390 students. For a period of time until the school moved to its new location, the third and fourth grades were housed at Beth Shalom. CDS moved to its current location, on the corner of Forward Avenue and Beechwood Boulevard, in the fall of 1996. The site had housed St. Philomena’s Church and School from 1922 until 1993. The Jewish Federation of Pittsburgh purchased the property from St. Philomena’s and planned to use it a nursing home. Neighbors objected to the nursing home plan, urging instead that the property continue to serve as an educational center. The Federation then deeded the property to the JEI, and the main building was renovated to house CDS. In August 1996, a group of parents built two playgrounds funded by the school’s Parent Teacher Organization. The doors of the school’s new building (and current location) opened on September 3, 1996, CDS implemented its dress code in the 1990s.

Please see Antisemitism, page 14

BY THE NUMBERS

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In 1998, Frank Smizik became the third person to serve as principal of the school. He added an interscholastic sports program and other after-school extracurricular programs, while continuing to improve the academic curriculum of the school.

Key Developments & Fun Facts

Grade Levels: Early Childhood (3-year-old room and Pre-K) through Grade 8 Enrollment: 275

In 2002, the community made a decision to separate the services division of JEI and the School of Advanced Jewish Studies from Community Day School, allowing CDS toFaculty: have44a small, Student-Teacher Ratio: 6:1 focused board and independence. Community Day School became independent on June 23, 2004. Average Class Size: 14 During this time, class sizes averaged about 35 students with two classrooms per grade.

LOCAL

In 2002-2003, CDS middle school students Maya Krasnow, Ingrida Ramanaviciene, and Pam Savitz submitted the winning design for the “Keeping Tabs” Holocaust Memorial; additional students worked on the final concept of the sculpture with artist Elena Hiatt Houlihan. Social studies teacher Bill Walter had started the project of collecting six million tabs from soda-pop cans in 1996; his idea was to help students comprehend the loss of six million Jewish lives during the Holocaust. In total, the project took more than seventeen years to complete; CDS opened the memorial on its campus in 2013.

HISTORY

EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY

There is holiness in the teaching and learning that takes place in classrooms, and this process is not only about knowledge, but also about transforming learners so they can transform the world.

FOOD

At the end of the 2004 school year, Frank Smizik retired, and Avi Baran Munro became the fourth person to serve as principal / Head of School. Avi had served as Education Coordinator and Lower School Head for six years, and as Teacher Development Coordinator at the JEI for several years. All four of her children have graduated from CDS.

Key Developments & Fun Facts

Under the leadership of Head of School Avi Munro, CDS implemented a “Mensch” program, updates to its curriculum, and organized the school into vertical units known as “Shavatim,” named after the twelve tribes of Israel. Each tribe includes students ranging from the school’s youngest through eighth graders.

Rabbi turns police chaplain

Gary and Nancy Tuckfelt Keeping Tabs: A Holocaust Sculpture was dedicated to commemorate six million Jewish lives that were lost in the Holocaust. CDS opened a Pre-K classroom in fall 2013 and a three-year-olds’ classroom in fall 2016.

The playground was redesigned with the help of students and parents. And in 2015-2016, with generous support from the CDS Parent Association, a new Ga-Ga court was added to the playground. In January 2016, for the first time, instead of taking the “day off” for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, CDS students came together with the broader Pittsburgh community for a “day on,” learning, serving, and reflecting about the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. Green Team parents and student volunteers helped plant raised garden beds on the CDS campus. The Green Team also developed a “Farm Stand” experiential learning program. Through this program, students learn about Jewish tradition, farming, sustainability, and healthy living. They also learn how to make smoothies from a bicycle powered blender, and about participating in commerce at a local Farmer’s Market. In November 2016, the Squirrel Hill Urban Coalition honored Community Day School with a “Place Treasure” award. Today, CDS provides a nurturing, modern, academically excellent Jewish day school experience for students age 3 to Grade 8. With state-of the-art science and technology labs, a gracious library, performing arts spaces, two art studios, a music room, multi-purpose athletic field, a beautiful seven-acre campus, and the best teachers in the business, our students are inspired and thriving. They are thinkers, leaders, and friends.

What will they create next?

The oldest Jewish building in town

Panna cotta