Student Networking
Academy sends two delegates
to leadership conference.
riella Lis wants everyone to
know that the Jewish
Academy of Metropolitan
Detroit, in spite of having just 53 stu-
dents, offers plenty of opportunities
for social as well as intellectual growth.
"People say to me, 'You guys are
such a small school, you'll never be
able to get along socially,'" said the
JAMD freshman.
"We're very secluded now," Ariella
said of her school, which is part of
an increasing number of multi-
denominational Jewish day schools
in North America. "The school in
Thronto has about 1,000 students
and the New Jewish High School in
Boston [in its fourth year] already
has so many kids they can't fit all of
A
Give your CD
awake-up call.
them in one room," she said.
Ariella of Farmington Hills knows
all this information because she and
classmate Jason Garden, a JAMD
sophomore from West Bloomfield,
attended the first Jewish Student
Leadership Conference, NOV. 15 - 17
in Waltham, Mass.
Organizer was the North
American Association of Jewish
High Schools (NAAJHS).
The JAMD students joined 26
other teens from 13 different high
schools across the United States and
Canada to discuss similarities and
differences between their schools, to
network and to have a good time.
Organized discussion topics included
prayer, learning, scheduling, sports,
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from page 7
lower level of the JCC, will add an 11th-
grade class for the 2001-2002 academic
year. Applications are being accepted
now for ninth-11th grades.
"Each of you sitting here can be a pio-
neer," Dr. Helene Cohen, dean of aca-
demic affairs, told the audience.
Cohen said the three pillars of the
school are academic excellence, extensive
Jewish studies and strong co-curricular
activities.
"Academic excellence without a moral
view is dangerous," she continued.
"Moral vision without the power of aca-
demic excellence can be weak. A strong
co-curricular and extra-curricular pro-
gram are vital for developing each stu-
dent's full potential."
JAMD is one of a rapidly growing
number of unaffiliated, or multi-denom-
inational, Jewish high schools in North
America. So far, none of the others has
opened with such a large student body,
or received such abundant funding prior
to opening.
Academy students come from back-
grounds ranging from cultural Jewish to
Orthodox. Each student begins the
Jewish studies curriculum at his or her
own level, culminating in text study and
the applications of Jewish thought to
contemporary moral dilemmas.
The school requires attendance at one
of three morning minyanim: a mechitzah
minyan, where boys and girls pray sepa-
rately-, an egalitarian minyan, where they
pray together and girls may have leader-
ship roles; and a learners' minyan.
The four-year Hebrew requirement is
designed to give graduates proficiency in
Hebrew reading, writing and conversa-
tion, including study of great Hebrew
poets and writers of the modern era.
The Jewish curriculum is complement-
ed by a rigorous college preparatory cur-
riculum, including honors and Advanced
Placement courses. These are offered even
if enrollment in that course is very small.
Student Perspective
Freshman Elektra Petrucci of Royal Oak
graduated from the Oakland Steiner
School in Rochester Hills. She received
her Jewish education from Workmen's
Circle in Oak Park, which runs a cultur-
al Jewish supplementary school, called a
shut e, teaching Yiddish rather than
Hebrew.
"I was under the impression that get-
ting used to my new environment
would be difficult. I was wrong," she
said in a prepared speech to the audience
at the open house. In every Jewish
studies class, I feel challenged, but not
completely burned out," she added.
Also on the podium was sophomore
Rana Goldberg, class president.