L'dor Va'dor- From Generation to Generation

With the end of the school year fast approaching and my favorite Jewish holiday just around the corner I can't help but think of something I am normally doing this time of year, working at the Community Religious School of Yardley. I volunteered at this religious school for many years and later began working at Kol Emet's religious school.  

The Cause:
The Community Religious School of Yardley was a religious school created by several families who left their synagogue, didn't want to join another, but still wanted to continue their children's Jewish educations. The school had 10-15 kids at any given point from grades 5-7. There was one teacher who taught all the kids at one time, splitting them up for certain lessons, like Hebrew, to teach to their level. Every few weeks, another teacher came to lead Jewish songs and prayers. There were also 4 aides to help the teacher. I was one of these aides. The school was held in a community room at a local grocery store once a week. The school also took trips to a very Jewish section of NYC, apple picking for the Jewish new year, volunteering trips, and trips to houses for different holidays.

Pickle Guys in the Lower East Side of NYC with the religious school.

What I Did:
As an aide, I did all different types of things. During class, when we split up the students, I would work on practicing reading Hebrew with the older kids or teaching the younger kids how to read or write Hebrew. Also, I would help all the kids learn prayers, whether just for our yearly religious school service or in preparation for their B'nai Mitzvot. I would also help the kids learn about the different Jewish holiday through different activities. These activities could include reading a book about the holiday, going somewhere like apple picking, planing a carnival, or making edible treats related to the holiday. This was always the most fun and the activity I was most involved in. We made edible Sukkahs for Sukkot, edible Torahs for Simchat Torah, and fruit covered cookie pizzas for Tu B'shevat, just to name a few.

Fruit Covered Cookie Pizzas- Tu B'shevat

What I Learned:
Being an aide at the religious school was one of the best things I have ever done. I met a lot of great kids and truly enjoyed the time I got to spend with them while helping them learn all about Judaism.

While being an aide, I learned about teaching to different lifestyles and having to adapt plans to help everyone succeed. This is definitely a lesson I have and will continue to carry over to all parts of my life. When someone isn't getting something or won't cooperate, I try to teach the lesson a different way or present it in a different light in an attempt to get everyone to understand. This happens in my life even when deciding about something with friends when we have to look at things from different perspectives and in different ways to make sure everyone sees the full picture.

I also learned about how all topics can be made interesting and captivating if you figure out the right way to present them. This is another good lesson to be applied to daily life when you are trying to keep people interested in anything you are trying to present and "sell" to them.

Finally, I learned more about sharing tradition. I have always viewed tradition as a very important part of religion and life in whole; however, this experience has made me appreciate it more. I now realize how important it is to pass tradition on from generation to generation, l'dor va'dor. I had the chance to pass on my tradition to the children I was teaching and it allowed me to analyze my own tradition more and really understand where it came from and why I stand for what I stand for.

It is important to reflect on your own traditions or you will loose sight as to why they are important and why they need to be passed on. If no one understands the importance of a tradition non one will pass it on and it will die where it is.

Splish, Splash, Is it Summer Yet?

With the weather still so spectacular it is getting harder and harder to focus on school. I know summer is just around the corner. This of course reminds me what I did for the past 10 summers, competitively swim on my township's swim team. For years, I volunteered at practices as a helper and then a coach. In more recent years, I got paid to coach practices but still volunteered at the meets.

My Last Home Meet as a Swimmer

The Cause:
The Lower Makefield Township (LMT) Swim and Dive Team is a competitive and recreational summer team. The point of the team is to create a fun environment for kids to learn the great sport that is swimming and diving. In my case, I focused on swimming. LMT's team not only creates a place to learn and perfect swimming and diving but allows the swimmers to make great friendships, I speak from experience, and to progressively prove and gain their responsibility and independence.

The swim team practices every weekday morning and competes most Tuesdays and Thursdays from June-July. While school is still in session there are afternoon practices. The team is divided by age group for practices and split into two divisions for meets, since there are so many swimmers.

Meet Schedule

What I Did:
When I was younger, I would get stuck at a pool, I couldn't swim in, until my brother finished practice. So, I began to help set up lane lines and help run the dry land for the kids in the younger age groups than me. As time progressed the head coach and other coaches allowed me to help them a bit and see what coaching was really like. As soon as I was old enough to coach I became, Coach Laura.

I absolutely love coaching. While coaching, I teach the swimmers new drills, run practice sets, and give them pointers of what they can change to improve their stroke and speed. I also spend lots of time working with the swimmers on starts and finishes. If I could ever get in the water to help I would. Whenever we had Fun Friday practices, I tended to be the one in charge of the games and activities throughout the younger practices.

At swim meets, I make sure everyone is in the right place. To do this, I check the roster, the kids in line, and their events marked on their hand to make sure they are in the right place, this is extremely important for relays. To make this process go a bit faster, I also help explain the process to the parents in charge of the little kids, the mouse moms, and help them throughout the night. I also watch the meet, cheer on the swimmers, and give them pointers based on their race.

The Roster

What I Learned:
Volunteering on the swim team has taught me so much. I learned how to be a good team member as well as a leader. We've had some really strong leaders to rally behind through the years as well as some weak ones. Figuring out what to do in both situations has allowed me to improve my skills of working in a team setting as a leader and member of the team.

I also learned how to deal with urgent issues, like finding a kid who is about to swim and is no where to be found. This type of stressful situation is easy to handle as long as you know how and stay clear headed throughout.

One of my favorite lessons is realizing how much of a role model bigger kids are to little kids. I saw this both as I saw some kids become attached to me and others attach to other older swimmers. This made me realize that you never know who may be watching you as a role model. You should always live as though someone will follow your actions and you may surprise yourself at what you can do.

As I've said in past posts, it is great to share your passion with others. I absolutely love swim team and to help others share this experience is one of the best ways to spend my time, in my opinion. Sharing a passion in this way keeps you excited and allows the passion to be passed to others.

Finally, the most important lesson I learned from volunteering on the swim team is: Have Fun! Without fun there really is no point. You are there to have a great summer, make friends, and learn a great sport, so go out and do it. This lesson clearly carries over to everyday. I believe in living life to it's potential by having fun, even when doing boring things. My great aunt always says "You have to make your own fun, Kiddo." Swim team has shown me how important this is and how much more fun it can be when you drag others into your fun.

Were you on a swim team or other sport or summer activity? What did you learn? Feel free to comment!

Music for All: By The Youth

With the weather getting warmer I can't help but think of summer. Summer reminds me of a trip I took in the summer of 2014 to Italy with a great organization called the Youth Orchestra of Bucks County, YOBC. I was a member of this group throughout most of high school as a clarinetist and while belonging I always helped volunteer with the organization.

YOBC Italy Tour

The Cause:
YOBC is an audition based youth orchestra organization that rehearses at the Bucks County Community College on Sundays and holds a Winter and Spring concert. Every other year the organization takes a tour, around 12 days long, to a European country where they perform in global festivals and concerts featuring them.

Outdoor Performance in Florence, Italy for an Audience of Over 2,000

YOBC is split into 3 divisions- junior, intermediate, and advanced- which is made up of 13 different ensembles with a total of around 300 students. These ensembles include small groups, bands, and orchestras. 

In addition to working with all the students to improve their musical skills, the organization creates a friendly environment for music outside of school and works as an outreach group to get young kids interested in music. It also helps people with less money afford instruments so they too can play music. 

What I Did:
Every week, I would help set up and break down our rehearsal space. This would involve getting other kids to help me so I didn't have to do it alone and to all show our respect for the space we were generously given to rehearse in.

At the end of the Italy tour, on the bus ride between two towns, I interviewed everyone on the bus to see what their highlights of the trip were. These video interviews were then put together by our videographer to document everyone's take on the trip.

Recently I returned to YOBC for one of my brother's concerts and helped check students in and chaperone them with my parents.

The biggest project I volunteered with YOBC for was during my final year in the organization. I worked closely with the Executive Director, Colleen Sweetsir, on an outreach project. The goal of this project was to spike interest about music in little kids. Our goal age group was preschool age. The event was held at our local Barnes and Noble in the children's section where some fellow musicians and I "performed" the book. We had a narrator and I was the organizer and conductor. As the book was read and certain instruments were talked about those instruments were played for the children to hear. It went something like this...

After the performance, the kids got to participate in an instrumental "petting zoo." Where they could touch the instruments and talk to the musicians to learn more about the instruments.

To prep for this event, I worked with the Executive director to figure out what instruments were needed and what musicians we would ask to participate. Then, we both meant with the individual instrumentalists to work out how we wanted each instrument to sound. Then, we had a rehearsal with everyone participating where we read and played through the book to make sure everyone understood how it would go. At the actual event, I helped set up and make sure everyone and everything was where we needed it.

What I Learned:
Throughout all of my volunteering with YOBC I have learned the importance of gaining respect and trust from others. Working closely with the Executive Director, I observed how everyone was always attentive in her presence and willing to do whatever she asked of them. I wanted to become a leader like her. I learned that to gain respect of others you need to respect them and show them you respect them. You must treat people with common decency and show them you are willing to listen to them and work with them to make whatever you are doing a better experience better for everyone. I got a chance to practice this with Farkle McBride and learned how to take all ideas into consideration but still deciding what would work best for the group.

Also, it is important to show your respect for others even when you aren't trying to gain them as followers. This was shown in how we had to keep our rehearsal space clean and correct, as we were just borrowing the space.

Photo By: Patrick Marione

I also learned that yelling is not the best way to get attention, make everyone hear you, and listen to you. Sometimes you need to be quiet and wait for others.

By doing all this, I learned that you gain trust from your equals and superiors. This is really important to success and being allowed to do more to enhance your experiences.

Finally, I learned/was reminded of the importance in sharing your passion. I spent lots of time playing music in high school. When I saw the pure joy and amazement on the faces of kids who were hearing some of these instruments for the first time it reminded me of what made me start playing in the first place. It was really cool to see these kids become interested in something for the first time that I had been working hard at for the past 9 years.

It's important to be reminded of the beauty and even amazement for others in something you do everyday and that has become normal for you to do.

My Feet Have Never Hurt So Bad

The Cause:
Being my first post after THON and being a volunteer at THON it is only appropriate that today's post to be about THON. If you don't know, THON is the world's largest student run philanthropy.

Most people only think about the 46 hour dance marathon where no one is allowed to sit as being THON.

In reality this event just caps off an entire year of hard work. The year between each THON weekend, the dance marathon, is filled with lots of fundraising. All different types of organizations focus on raising money for THON, whether it be there main purpose or something they do on the side, for the year leading up to THON. Fundraising goes from sending letters, emails, social media campaigns, canning, canvassing, and a variety of events to make money all for THON.

What does THON do with all this money?

THON's only beneficiary is the Four Diamonds Foundation which uses the money to help families with kids diagnosed with cancer pay for treatment and other services where insurance stops. Thanks to Four Diamonds, these families never see a bill and can focus their attention on their children.

Four Diamond Sign

Left over money goes to Hershey Medical Center. They use the money to continue researching possible cures for pediatric cancer.

What I Did:

For THON this year, I was on a Rules and Regulation's committee, which is pretty much security. We had meetings every Wednesday since October to learn everything we needed to as well as become close with the people we would spend the weekend with. I was always in charge of icebreakers

The weekend of, I had my first shift 3PM- 8PM Friday and my last shift 5am- 10am Sunday. Each shift was slightly different and provided a new perspective on THON. In the beginning, no one was there yet but we were next to the floor when the dancers arrived and got to see their excitement for the challenge that was in front of them.

We also got to be back stage and on the floor in the beginning when families were first there. Some of my committee members got soaked by the kids' water guns. While next to the stage we were guarding certain areas, answering questions, looking for people sitting, and keeping an eye out for anything suspicious that may need more attention.

After this and for almost every other shift we were in the stands. When in the lower bowl of the BJC we were in charge of patrolling the aisles to make sure everyone in the section was standing and not breaking any other rule, guarding portal doors and closing them as necessary, and watching the concourse.

In the upper bowl, we were just in charge of watching the stands in our section to make sure rules were being followed.

It was really cool to see the event going on from different locations in the BJC and witness the entire stadium shake and fill with energy during special events- pep rally, family hour, ect.- and every line dance no matter what time it was.

What I Learned:

In regards to security, I learned people feel a sense of entitlement even when it is no where near justified. One shift I was working the gate because we needed to build a human wall. People were trying to burst in when the building was at capacity and were arguing with security when they were told they had to wait and couldn't enter at that point. For an event that was supposed to be about others this shocked me a bit.

I also learned the true definition of a support group. During family hour everyone in the BJC had there arms around each other as they were watching the Celebration of Life video. This was probably the most powerful thing I have seen. Thousands of teens coming together and truly uniting no matter their organization or reason for being there to support the kids and families going through things most of us can, thankfully, never understand.

Throughout the weekend, my committee was a support group for me as we all helped each other get through the long shifts when we could barely stand anymore. I have never been more relieved to get off my feet, eat, and sleep than after a shift.

My Captain

Finally I learned the total really doesn't matter. While it is always nice to surpass last years total THON went through a lot this year and still being able to raise almost $10,000,000 is truly an impressive task. Plus, we are not there for the money were are there "For the Kids" and it is important to remember this throughout such an overwhelming weekend as THON.

With this being said, I also learned THON is not for everyone. Some people would rather stay at home and maybe check in on the live webcast now and then and this is completely okay! People should be able to experience this event as well as any other in any way they want to.

My faith is restored that people are willing to volunteer. I just wish I saw them doing it for more activities than THON.