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Round 1 *

Making Meaning - This concept focuses on professional development that helps teachers validate and foster a broad range of Jewishly engaged behavior, encouraging students to link their passions with their Jewish identity and to see and develop themselves as Jewishly engaged individuals leading Jewishly meaningful lives.

JDS for All - This model allows Jewish Day Schools to focus on what they do best. This will create a more sustainable model for Jewish education, run by the day school itself, yet focused on children who attend public school. The model is significantly more affordable than the traditional day school and has the potential to expand the reach of day schools.

Torah Lishma - The “Torah Lishma” model focuses on developing a personal connection with Judaic studies by leveraging intrinsic motivation.

Teacher Torah Collaboratory - Teacher Torah Collaboratory creates an innovative form of professional development. As part of a year long journey beginning with a summer institute, the holistic program will organize a Professional Learning Community that encourages educators to hone their professional learning, reflect on their experiences, and create more effective education.

A Taste of Innovation Showcase *

Making Meaning - This concept focuses on professional development that helps teachers validate and foster a broad range of Jewishly engaged behavior, encouraging students to link their passions with their Jewish identity and to see and develop themselves as Jewishly engaged individuals leading Jewishly meaningful lives.

Masora Program - This program develops the Big Ideas around which our instruction is focused, the texts and resources, and the modalities in which learning take place. We emphasize meaning and personal relevance in Judaic Studies. In the words of a seventh grader, Masora “is not just something you learn to get a good grade for this year and then forget it. It's for our lives now and for the future."

Raising a Global Citizen - With the implementation of IB, Judaics and general studies will no longer operate in separate academic spheres. They will be integrated into a cohesive program that provides a moral, global, and Jewish context for all areas of learning – including math, art, music, and physical education. Jewish values, history, and Torah learning will go hand-in-hand with science, social studies, and mathematics. The values of rodeph shalom, tikkun olam, and chesed will imbue all courses. Every course – regardless of its focus – will help students to ask, and answer, essential questions about their personal responsibility in our community and world.

Tefilah Re-Imagined - The students focus on a social-emotional curriculum where they engage in a theme of understanding Tefilah from a personal and community perspective. The students learned how to be mindful and have learned how to take their personal connection to Tefilah and engage in it in any environment.

Round 2 *

Encounters with G-d - Through this model, teachers become more comfortable within their own spirituality and become more adept at expressing it.

Identity Builders - This model empowers educators to help students define who they are, shifting the focus of the classroom from accepted predetermined truths to a growth mindset which uses sources to develop identity that is informed by our sacred texts and traditions.

Research and Development Department - Based on concrete, deliberate, evidence-based, collaborative activities, this initiative incorporates the educators in the process of creativity and research. While the idea of an R&D lab was inspired by the work of a successful educational R&D model from The American School of Bombay, the ethos of the project comes from Torah mission to find the best way to teach the Mesorah.