AJEX

This week AJEX have visited both schools to run workshops with the Year 9 History students. We were visited by Paula Kitchen (education officer at AJEX), veterans Leonard Stern (National Serviceman) and Frank Ashleigh (Fighter pilot during World War II) and Jonathan Kober (telling Jack Lewis’ army story). A range of activities helped all of the students to learn about the first-hand experiences of these Jewish Veterans.

The last activity consisted of three presentations by the students. This is an extract from the excellent presentation by Shua, Chananya, Ami and Shaul:

“Frank Ashleigh was born in 1924 and grew up in London. He volunteered for the British Army on his 18th birthday in 1942. He was part of the Glider Pilot Regiment.

Training lasted six weeks. The first exercise of the day before breakfast was a 5 mile run for 1 hour wearing full equipment. He had to wake up at 5:30am every day and had to know how to use every German and British weapon. He also trained in hand-to-hand combat.

Ashleigh worked as a glider pilot in the battle of Arnhem in September 1944. Field Marshal Montgomery planned to capture the bridge over the Rhine from Holland to the Ruhr, the industrial area of Germany to stop German production. His glider plane landed safely and discharged four soldiers, a jeep and two trailers. He volunteered for a reconnaissance mission. He and the three others including one officer went to a place swarming with German soldiers. They hid in a church, went up to the roof and went for four days with no food. There was a window and each day they would go up and down, firing a few shots. The Germans didn’t know they were there. A German then came into the church. The officer stood up and got shot in the stomach. He went down and the Germans found out where they were and ordered them to come down. The three remaining soldiers disabled their weapons and went down. They were taken to a camp until the end of the war. They were taken on an 87-mile march for 17 days to another camp until they were rescued by the Red Army and were sent back to England.”

Thank you to the History Department for organising these very important visits, and to the veterans- it is such a privilege to have them visit us at Hasmonean.

WAS Wellbeing

Hasmonean School for Girls is very proud to have been awarded the Wellbeing Award for Schools, thanks in no small part to the efforts of Mrs Waugh. Part of the process included a full day verification (assessment) of all stakeholders (parents, staff, governors and students), all of our files, our school and all eight objectives. The award was developed in partnership with the National Children’s Bureau (NCB).

This whole-school award focuses on ensuring effective practice and provision is in place to promote the emotional wellbeing and mental health of both staff and students.

The award has a focus on changing the long-term culture of a school, and embedding an ethos where mental health is regarded as the responsibility of all.

With this award, schools can:

• Show their commitment to promoting mental health as part of school life
• Improve the emotional wellbeing of their staff and students
• Ensure mental health problems are identified early and appropriate support provided
• Offer provision and interventions that matches the needs of its students and staff
• Engage the whole-school community in the importance of mental health awareness
• Capture the views of parents, students and teachers on mental health issues

The school will hold the award until 2022, during which time Hasmonean School for Girls will continue to develop its wellbeing services.

The Development of Social Learning Experiment

Over the past few weeks, I have taken part in an experiment for University College London. The experiment would help one of the University’s studies associated with teenagers and their ability to learn about social information changes.

Besides the payment offered, my friends and I decided this would be a good opportunity to do something different and learn how to commit to something. There were two sessions at school led by a lady called Jovita and 14 days of mind training at home.

The in-school session was made up of quite a few mind games, consisting of pictures in different scenarios, faces with different expressions, i.e., sad or happy, and words being displayed on the screen. These words could be either positive words, negative words, or neutral ones, like the word ‘table’ or ‘cat’. In some of the games we had to remember the location of the faces on a 4×4 grid, on some of them we had to see if the word matched the face, and others we had to see if the picture was positive or negative. After this game, we were connected to an online questionnaire regarding our feelings, emotions and actions in different social circumstances.

We were sent another questionnaire was about our feelings towards our personal development and the people around us and given a link to an App. This consisted of three games, similar to the ones we had done in school. For the first three days the App picked the game for us and after this we were allowed to pick for ourselves. The three games included us remembering the location of faces, remembering previous words, and a mix of the two. There was then a final session in school.

In conclusion, my friends and I were happy to have taken part in the UCL experiment. The training sessions took time and thought, but I am happy I participated. This has been a really great experience and I would truly recommend this to anyone thinking of doing it in the years ahead. Not only have I helped UCL out with their experiments, I have learnt the importance of commitment and the meaning of time.

By Nicole Bishop
Year 8

The Year 9/10 Boys Leadership Team 2019

Seated: Avishai Ostilly, Eyal Eisenstein (Leader), Jakey Conway
Standing: Avi Landau, Tzviki Levine, Laivi Sykes

Show your support for Shloimy!

Year 12 student Shloimy Hodges is an exceptional young man who has taken it upon himself to do the Prudential Bike Ride in August – and raise money for Hasmonean while cycling the 46-mile route.

Shloimy has been a keen cyclist for around 10 years.  “In the last two years I have started cycling longer distances and faster. I have known about Prudential Ride London for a number of years now but the youngest age of entry was 16.  This year I decided I would try to do the 46 mile ride as I am now old enough to enter”

Asked why he chose this ride, Shloimy said “the best part about this event is the ability to ride on empty London roads. The entire route is shut to all road users apart from cyclists taking part in this awesome ride. The final stretch on The Mall is a dream as the road surface is perfect for bikes and the crowds on the sides waiting to cheer everyone on will create a wonderful atmosphere for the finish.”

Please support Shloimy – and Hasmonean – as he wends his way towards the Mall on Sunday 4th August!

To sponsor Shloimy please click here: https://www.gofundme.com/f/cycling-prudential-ride-london-46-for-my-school

To follow his training progress, click here: https://www.strava.com/athletes/shloimy_hodges

 

Editorial 04/07/2019

Dear Parents,

I have just finished a very interesting book by the American psychologist Lisa Damour called Under Pressure. It follows an earlier book –Untangled. They both focus specifically on the challenges of bringing up girls but much of what she says is also relevant to boys. I would recommend both books.
I want to highlight two things from the book.

The first is that children have a public face which they show at school. Then there is a private face at home when they can relax and let their emotions out. It is important to realise that your child may just want to sound off about their day without wanting action to be taken. Children can also be very good at transference so they will leave an issue with you and then be quite happy because you now have the problem and they can relax and get on with enjoying their evening. This can be very uncomfortable for us as adults as we do not like to see our children upset but, sometimes, it is best just to be patient and see if it is still a problem the next day before taking action. This enables children to build resilience by understanding that their mood and feelings can improve without direct intervention from adults.

The second point is the mixed messages we send out about honesty. We quite rightly want to bring our children up to be honest and truthful but this can lead girls in particular to feel that they have to share every detail of their lives with their friends which can be unhelpful for them. As adults we know we do not always tell the whole truth as to do so might be hurtful. So we teach our young children that they should not comment, for example on someone’s appearance or if they are not enjoying a visit to an elderly relative. If someone asks us to a social event that we do not want to go to, we have graceful ways to decline which leave the friendship intact. The crucial thing is the motivation: if you are less than totally honest out of a desire to be kind to the other person rather than from the intention to deceive, then that is probably the right thing to do. But we should never use this as a reason to avoid taking responsibility for something we have done wrong or in order to mislead.

Have a good Shabbos,

Mrs K Brice
Headteacher

Big come back for the International Food Day Lunch!

On Tuesday the Year 8 boys made three separate meals representing the languages taught here at Hasmonean: Spanish, French and Hebrew. In their language lessons, Year 7 and 8 students created posters, displays of phrases and menus in the relevant language and helped to create a real buzz of languages in the Boys’ lunch hall.

Well done to Ms Ger for organising this year’s event. And huge thank you to Ms Stavrou and her students for the exquisite food.

The success was so overwhelming that all the food was sold out in the first 15 minutes of the first lunch!

Thank you to all who supported the event.

Gracias * Toda*Merci

Wings of Hope Achievement Award

An amazing 58 schools nationally have taken part in the Wings of Hope Achievement Award this year which makes it extra-special that one of our teams won a prize in the finals. The social enterprise programme WOHAA, which has been running for 14 years, supports children through providing free education to underprivileged children in India and Malawi, at the same time as developing the skills and ambitions of secondary school students in the UK. Students gain valuable skills from close mentoring and workshops from corporate partners such as the London Business School and John Lewis.

Hasmonean High School for Girls had five teams which took part in the programme which started last October. PositiviTeam, Team Butterfly, Team Wings of Tomorrow, Team Opportunity and Team Wings of the World spent several months organising activities that would raise funds and awareness for the charity. These included donut sales, bake sales, raffles and mug sales plus many more! Our winning team, Team Opportunity (Shira Myers, Gabriella Jacob, Talia Jacob) did activities such as a raffle but, what made them stand out, was the comic book they created and sold. The team worked well together and produced a snapshot project detailing their WOHAA journey which really impressed the judges! On Wednesday night, at the finals, Shira Myers, Talia Jacob and Gabriella Jacob of Team Opportunity won an award in the ‘Exemplary Team’ category. All three girls have done an excellent job over the last few months in raising money and awareness for this charity which provides an education for some of the poorest children in the world, in addition to developing their own entrepreneurial and team-working skills.

If you see Team Opportunity around the school, please congratulate them. They are a humble, unassuming trio who have worked well together supporting a very good cause.

Prize Day – Boys’ School

Prize Day at Hasmonean High School for Boys kicked off with the talented Zak Wolfson playing the theme tune from “The Muppets” as parents and guests took to their seats. It was a fitting way to start an afternoon full of laughter and joy in celebrating the achievements of our students.

Mrs Lebrett warmly welcomed the award winners and was received with a raucous round of applause when announcing that Hasmonean was among the top non-selective state schools for public examinations for the seventh consecutive year. In her opening address, Mrs Lebrett spoke about the qualities of leadership found in this week’s sedra, Shelach Lecha. The examples of Joshua and Caleb demonstrate the importance of fostering a sense of confidence in the people they lead; in a message to our prize winners, the leaders of the future, Mrs Lebrett made it clear that those who say, “we cannot do it” are probably right, as are those who say “we can.” Solid and justified confidence, based on preparation and performance, leads to triumph.

Hasmonean does not scrimp on the opportunities it provides students with to display the qualities of a good leader. In addition to formal studies, this year there has been an Achdus trip for Year 7 boys, Gateshead Gesher trips, a trip to Scotland, a moving experience for Sixth Formers in Poland, visits to St Joseph’s Hospice in Hackney, football matches in aid of One Child Ghana and the Boys Clubhouse, a Purim Talent Show, visits from 26 Yeshivos, and talks by AJEX veterans and visiting artists.

There was no time however for a tipple or a tantalising and tasty treat supplied by Ms Stavrou and her Food Technology students as the afternoon swiftly moved on to Rabbi Golker, Menahel, and his address to prize winners. Presenting a Dvar Torah on the theme of leadership, Rabbi Golker used Moshe Rabbeinu’s example to show the dual qualities of successful leadership: being a “man of war”, strong and principled, and being a “man of the people” humble and grounded. Rabbi Golker was able to celebrate the success of our students and provide them with a key message for their futures. Indeed, this message of leadership was verified with the introduction of the keynote speaker and guest of honour, Rabbi Lerer of the Central Synagogue in the West End, who began his career in a blazer and a maroon tie, sitting in a Hasmonean classroom alongside Rabbi Golker.

Rabbi Lerer’s stirring and inspirational address focused on the perceptions of humility based on the pasuk, “Vesham Ra’eenu et Hanifilim Bnei Anak Min Hanifilim Vanehi Ve’eynenu Kachagavim Vechain Hayinu Be’eyneyhem,” (There we saw the Nephillim the sons of the giant from among the Nephillim. We were like grasshoppers in our eyes and so we were in their eyes.) Rabbi Lerer stated that many people assume that someone who is humble think themselves to be worthless. But he also noted the words of Baroness Campbell who said, “Humility is not thinking less of yourself; it’s thinking about yourself less.”

Naftoli Stimler, Head Boy, presented a meaningful speech about the concept of respect and how this can lead to success and growth within a community; he therefore gave the boys an encouraging and stimulating message for their time ahead at Hasmonean. A powerful First Give presentation on JAMI by Year 9 students Daniel LeBlanc, Ben Gersch and Eitan Korman, under the guidance of Rabbi Liss, showed this message of respect in practice. Furthermore, Ari Wolff, “Speak Out” Regional Champion, delivered a riveting, creative and eloquent speech on the topic of exams which showed everyone in the hall that Hasmonean boys have a powerful voice in the wider community. He was a true credit to Mrs Serfaty and to the whole English department.

Accompanied by musical entertainment gifted students Zak Wolfson, Uriel Lev and Dov Samuels, Mrs Lebrett distributed the awards and turned to Mr McClusky, CEO, to end what was a wonderful afternoon with his vote of thanks.

It was an evening which truly inspired all the senses: our eyes were wondered by the display of gallery-worthy art created by the boys and collated by Mrs Jenks and Mr Bazen; our nostrils quivered and tongues tingled with the morsels from the Food Technology Department; our ears were marvelled under the leadership of Mrs Algranati and the musical prowess of her students; and as the parade of delighted boys walked up to the stage, the feeling of pride that emanated from the hall was tangible.

Prize Day – Girls’ School

Mrs Brice’s first Prize Day was a special afternoon spent recognising the efforts and achievements of all of our girls. The prize winners were the girls who have worked hard, helped others and added to the great sum of Chesed within and outside of school. The amount of volunteering by our girls includes the Bnei Mitzva programme at Jewish Care, BritSom, Shabbat Walks and GIFT. Our girls have an immense impact on the wider community. They also lead in Jewish Education; Halina Maierovits came fifth in the International Tenach Quiz in Jerusalem, lots of the girls have written contributions to the Ezra girls’ Haggada, they lead children’s services and teach in Chaderim across London. In total, our girls are in training to be strong young women who can be leaders in our community and in the wider world.

Rabbi Golker gave a Dvar Torah acknowledging the achievements of the students and commenting on the expressions on the parents faces as they shine with nachas at the success of their daughters.

The keynote speaker was Ms Abigail Morris, CEO of the Jewish Museum. Although the museum itself is a small building, it has a mighty outreach as its exhibitions travel the country and the globe. Despite failing her 11+ exams and being asked to leave the Sixth Form as she was seen as an academic failure; Ms Morris found success at Camden School for Girls where she was encouraged to try for Cambridge…and succeeded!

At Cambridge she founded Trouble and Strife, which went on to succeed at the Edinburgh Festival. From there she worked at the Royal Court and moved on to the Soho Theatre, this time as CEO. Her production of Kindertransport was a huge success, making it to Broadway. The theatre bought the Dean Street Synagogue and Ms Morris ran it for five years whilst being a mother of three children.

With a young family, she also felt it was time to engage with her Jewish roots: attending Limmud, working for Jewish Women’s Aid and she also worked for a Jewish think tank. Here, she discovered secrets to ‘a long and happy life’:

• Be thankful
• Lifelong learning
• Stay connected to community and family
• Chesed- helping others
• Healthy living.

She discovered these secrets through a study of various groups of people, including a community of nuns! She offered resilience as the key weapon with which to tackle life.

Following Ms Morris’ very well received words, Kayla Samuels played Bohemian Raphsody before the distribution of prizes and Naomi Zeidman wrapped up the awards with Blues Panther- which was her GCSE composition.

Hannah Benaim, Head Girl, began by speaking about Beattie Deutsch, a religious marathon runner who has run many marathons without ever compromising her religious standards. She thus presents a wonderful role model and hero for Hasmonean girls.

After thanking everyone who made the afternoon possible, Mr McClusky turned to the girls to praise them for their many and varied achievements.