22 | MARCH 9 • 2023 

O

n Tuesday, Feb. 7, a 
team of Jewish high 
school students pre-
sented at a history class taught 
by Mark Catani at Pershing 
High School in Detroit to 
explain what Jewishness means 
to them. 
This was the first presenta-
tion by Metro Detroit Student 
to Student, a program coordi-
nated by Sam Dubin (assistant 
director/director of media 
relations of the JCRC/AJC in 
Detroit), along with Sam Kole 
(AJC Young Leadership associ-
ate) and Tamara Lopes (JCRC/
AJC community associate). 
Pastor Sterling Brewer of King 
David Baptist Church and 
Executive Committee member 

of the Coalition for Black and 
Jewish Unity also attended 
this presentation. 
One of the Student to 
Student team members, 
Meredith Shapiro, a junior 
at Cranbrook/
Kingswood 
Upper School, 
described her 
visit to Pershing 
High School. “
At 
the beginning of 
the day, my fellow 
Student to Student representa-
tives and I met at a Starbucks 
— a convenient place to talk 
about what we were going to 
discuss. We talked about the 
different points we want to 
highlight and what we should 

really expect.
”
The students then carpooled 
with the adult facilitators 
to Pershing High School in 
Detroit, at which point they 
were signed in at the office and 
led to the classroom. The stu-
dents spoke for about an hour 
to a group of 20-30 students 
about various facets of Judaism.
Another member of the 
Student to Student team, 
Julia Feber, also a high school 
junior, did the introduction 
to Judaism, and then, Feber 
explains, “We each took turns 
presenting the material — 
alternating who did the speak-
ing.
” 
In addition to discussing 
their personal backgrounds, 

the presenters covered a range 
of topics including, according 
to Shapiro, “holidays, differ-
ent traditions, what it means 
to keep Shabbat, the differ-
ent branches of Judaism, the 
Holocaust and even the Jewish 
impact on the civil rights 
movement.
”
Feber felt surprised by what 
her audience did not already 
know about Jewishness. 
“I was raised in a majority 
Jewish environment: I went to 
a Jewish day school and I go to 
shul. I was surprised by what 
the students did not know,
” 
Feber said.
When she said, “Raise your 
hand if you have heard of 
the Holocaust,
” she got some 
response, but not much. “Raise 
your hand if you have heard 
of Chanukah” got a better 
response; lots of students know 
something about Chanukah. 
“Raise your hand if you have 
heard of Rosh Hashanah,
” not 
so much. 
“Pretty much no one knew 
about Rosh Hashanah,
” Feber 
said. “We asked them what per-
centage of America is Jewish, 
and we got answers like ‘40%’ 
and ‘50%.
’ They were shocked 
when we told them that the 
right answer is less than 2%.
” 
Feber and Shapiro agree 
that hands-on segments of the 
presentations drew the most 
engagement from their audi-
ence. 
“The students perked up 
when we passed around a prop, 
no more sitting on their hands. 
The props worked,
” Feber said.
One of the presenters 
brought a shofar, which 
Shapiro sounded. Many of the 
Pershing students also tried to 
sound the shofar. Another pre-
senter brought sugar cookies 
with sprinkles from a kosher 
bakery. The Pershing students 
enjoyed that treat, which 
Shapiro describes as what she 
used to get in day care and 
would expect to see at a post-

OUR COMMUNITY

Meredith 
Shapiro

Metro Detroit Student 
to Student does its 
first presentation at 
Pershing High School.

Sharing the 
Faith

LOUIS FINKELMAN 
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Julia Feber

