Abraham Joshua Heschel School

The Abraham Joshua Heschel School (AJHS) is a pluralistic K-12 Jewish day school in New York City. Its two central values, pluralism and egalitarianism, create a tightly-knit, yet diverse community. Located in Manhattan, the school seeks to follow the example of its namesake, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who sought to make the world a better place for members of the community, Jews, and everyone throughout the world.

chools

The Abraham Joshua Heschel School's student body is divided up into several buildings due to space constraints. Namely, there is an early childhood center and lower school, a middle school, and a newly constructed high school. All three buildings can be found on the west side of Manhattan.

The high school

The newly built high school contains a diverse student body, and it is run on a more democratic system than many similar schools, which is outlined below.

tudent body

The Heschel High School (or AJHHS) students come from a variety of neighborhoods within New York and New Jersey. There is a constituency from every borough of New York City, and several students commute from Westchester and Riverdale. The student body also contains a varied international representation that includes Switzerland, Ukraine, Russia, Argentina, Venezuela, Austria, South Baghdad, The United Arab Emirates and Israel.

Clubs

Clubs constitute a large part of the social life at The Heschel High School. Most clubs are supervised by a faculty member. Some clubs, such as the A cappella group and Finance are, in fact, completely student supervised.

Club List:

*Newspaper - "Heschel Helios" [ [http://helios.heschel.org mizrahi.myvnc.com ] ]
*Debate- led by Sandra Silverman
*Mock Trial- led by Bruce Gitlin
*Model UN- led by Sarah Fendrick
*Chess
*A Cappella- The Heschel Harmonizers
*Photography
*Drama
*Sports Debate
*Ping-Pong
*Movie- led by Jessica Gribetz
*Math and Science
*Linguistics - led by Jeff Segall
*Zoology Society- founded by Elliot Sion led by Danny Aviv
*Current Events - founded by Sarah Bayefsky-Anand
*Finance/Investment
*Chesed - Founded by Raisie Saad and Moises Cohen
*Literary Magazine- Epitome
*Creative Writing
*Green Team- Founded by Adin Lenchner, Eliana Lauter, Ariel Meislin, and Maya Matalon
*Book
*Jazz Band 1 - led by Ari "Mix Master" Gold
*Jazz Band 2 - led by Ari "Mix Master" Gold
*Clubjazz - led by Ari
*Chamber Music- Beaux Arts Ensemble
*Ultimate Frisbee
*Asian Apreciation Club
*Save Sderot led by Sydney Appelbaum and Zoe Bohrer
*Bikor Cholim led by David Khagan

Also included in the clubs category are committees that exist within the High School. Such committees include Student Senate and the Fairness Committee. These groups are not open to participants, but rather representatives are elected by the Student Body.

*Student Senate
*Va'ad Tzedek- or "Fairness Committee"
*Graduation Committee
*Student Admission Representatives- SARs

The Heschel Helios

"The Heschel Helios" is the official student produced newspaper of the Heschel High School. The namesake of the newspaper follows with the High Schools heat theme (sports team- Heschel Heat). Helios is Greek for sun. The student club aims to produce four issues per school year. The club goes through a complete traditional newspaper experience. The process includes "slugging" articles, writing the articles, producing images or graphics for feature articles, peer editing of editorials and articles and finally, layout and printing, the involved students get a full experience of how a newspaper operates. The newspaper's motto, "We stand for what we utter," was chosen in the Winter of 2005 and is an original quote from the school's namesake, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel.

"Just Community"

The Heschel High School, unlike its Middle and Lower counterparts runs on a system they call the "Just Community". This type of system was created to ensure that students and their desires are respected. Each student has a say in his or her life at school, and although the administration may veto their opinions, they will always be heard. Additionally, this system dictates that the student body votes upon a council to represent them early on in the year. This senate brings issues to the schools attention (and vice-versa) during weekly "town meetings" where issues are discussed, voted upon and, if approved, become part of Heschel Policy. Limitations on the length of homework assignments and the frequency of tests are two significant changes that were introduced by the students and have become a standardized feature of academic life at Heschel.

Students never have a say on topics related to religious policy, safety, and curriculum although they may always express their opinion.

All rules on which the student body (through the student senate) agrees are posted on the school constitution.

Technology usage

The High School is a "laptop" school. This means that all students are required to obtain the Heschel laptop to use it as a learning tool throughout their education. All teachers are equipped with laptops, and all classrooms contain smartboards, which they often use to record class notes.

This inclusion of technology gives students a responsibility to use their computers appropriately, as they can easily be used for good and bad.

Dual curriculum

All students at the Heschel School learn a dual curriculum, studying both Jewish and secular topics throughout the day. Although this leads to a longer day, students end up with a rich and varied education and bilinguality (Hebrew) from a young age.

The Heschel Heat is the name carried by the various sports teams that play for the High School. The teams include boys and girls basketball, girls volleyball, tennis, soccer, girls floor hockey, and track and field.

Disambiguation

The Heschel School located in Manhattan is not to be confused with the schools that go by the same name in Los Angeles, California and Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Despite having similar names, the three schools are not related at all, albeit by name.

ee also

*Education in New York City

References

External links

* [http://www.heschel.org Official site]