Koleinu

Night of Art and Music
This year's annual Night of Music and Art was a wonderful success! As in previous years the night was broken up in to several parts. The first half of the evening featured the visual arts. The first floor lobby, Media Lab and the Music room were transformed into a variety of gallery spaces.

Upon entering the lobby visitors were immediately struck by the magnificent Aron Kodesh created by this year's Artist in Residence, Siona Benjamin. The ark is truly breathtaking (right). The ark will be used by one of the Minyanim for daily tefila in the future. Along the wall opposite Siona's Ark were artistic pieces by the students who had worked with her this year. They studied the First Perek of Yechezkel which focuses on the Mercava and then created visual midrashic interpretations of this mysterious passage from the Torah. Unique transparent sticker-like images were made to create the look of stained glass. They currently hang on the windows of the caf�. To see more of Siona's art go to her website www.artsiona.com.

Also present at this year's Night of Music and Art was David Wander, his demonstration of wood carving was a preview to the Ark he is creating for SAR as next year's Artist in Residence. To see some examples of David's art, go to his website davidwanderstudio.com.
Mr. Andrew's 2-D Design club metamorphosed the Media Lab in to a unique installation of image, light and sound with projected drawings on the walls and dry erase renderings on the windows. The music room "gallery" had a rotating slide show with an impressive selection of student photographs including a one of a kind Linux presentation by junior Daniel Fialkovsky.

For the second portion of the evening guests were treated to a lineup of diverse musical performances as well as film and animation screenings.

Some of the stand-outs from the second half of the evening were:

The SAR Wind Ensemble led by Director Elana Obstfeld.
The choir singing several songs inspired by the life of David HaMalech including a very moving rendition of Leonard Cohen's "Halleluyah" led by Kenny Birnbaum and ALeonardak.
Senior Zev Hait beautifully singing the arrangement he created, Coldplay's "Fix-You", with a group of students (it was also his Senior Exploration Project.)

We kept it "in the family" with two duets; the first was "Bring Him Home" by Joey Katz, 12th grade, and his father and the second duet from "Dveikus," sung by brother and sister Tal and Erin Fortgang.
Talia Cotton, 11th grade, created a fantastic stop-motion animation, "The Very First" and Rebecca Abrams and Julia Falkenberg sang beautifully as always.

Appropriately, the evening ended where it began in Siona Benjamin's Native home of India with ''Shlom-Dog Millionaire" a film created and produced by film club members Sammy Ballan, Doni Bloomfield and Gideon Weiler.

Special thanks to the administration for making this night possible, to Nick Fadda and the custodial staff for all their hard work (especially Rob for helping Siona with her ark), to the office staff for helping with the program, to Jay Kusnetz and Peter Lewis, 10th grade, for all of their tech help, to all the students and staff who helped to hang the art and to Tobi Kahn for his continued guidance and council. Thank you from the art staff James Andrews, Anat Barak, Kenny Birnbaum, Siona Benjamin, David Friedman, Elana Obstfeld, David Wander, Lilly Weisz and Marius Zilberstein.

Five 11th Grade Mathematical Physics Students Earn the Physics Challenge
Each week in Mathematical Physics class, extra credit opportunities
are given to encourage students to extend the ideas of the course in
new directions. These assignments ask students to read about current events in physics, try more challenging problems, learn about topics
that are not covered in the regular lessons, and to prepare for the
SAT 2 in physics.

This year a record number of extra credit enrichment assignments were completed by students. Five students earned over 40 points of extra credit which means that they completed at least 20 assignments in an excellent fashion. The students are Alex Broome, Daniel Chamudot, Debby Greenstein, David Henslovitz, and Raffi Listman. These students were awarded the Physics Challenge which recognizes a student's commitment to enrich substantially his or her learning in
Mathematical Physics class.

Ron Zamir, SAR Science

SENIOR EXPLORATIONS
The last days of May at SAR High School annually brings about a lot of buzz, primarily because of the Senior Exploration presentations. This year was no exception. Each member of the senior class was required to spend countless hours pursuing a senior capstone project prior to graduation. In order to pass the program, the students needed to conduct research, meet with their mentors, write journal entries, interview experts in the field, and present in front of a faculty committee. Family and friends were also present in numerous presentations. There were so many memorable projects in diverse fields. Some seniors obtained five-week internships, a number did community service fieldwork, and the rest spent hours in the library doing research. Some of the highlights of the class included a study on Biblical archaeology and it how can prove/disprove parts of the Bible; an architectural rendering of a model synagogue; the complete writing and illustration of two children's books; learning how to become a shochet and a demonstration of schechita on a chicken; and astrology and Judaism. The projects that were truly extraordinary merited an Honors designation and there were certainly many deserving of such an award. The juniors were also invited to watch the presentations to see what it would be like for them next year, and a few have already started thinking about what projects they will pursue in the future.

The Senior Exploration Committee,
Michael Courtney, Allison Freedman, Lisa Grundman, Marjorie Jacobs, Ilana Mann and Rivka Schwartz

SAR Student Has Letter Published In
June 2009 Scientific American
We are thrilled to announce that a 'Letter to the Editor' written by 11th grade student, Daniel Chamudot, was published in the June 2009 edition of Scientific American. In it he posed a question to the author of the cover article entitled 'Naked Singularities', about stellar collapse. Please press the following link to see both Daniel's question and the author's response: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=letters-sciam-jun09

While Daniel is very modest about having the letter published, we told him we would like to give you an opportunity to see it.

Congratulations to Daniel as well, for being awarded the "The United Hospital Fund Volunteer Service Award" at Memorial Sloan Kettering for over 150 hours of volunteer work he has done in the medical physics research lab of Dr. Youself Mazaheri. The award ceremony was held on June 4, 2009. We are so proud of you, Daniel!

Tobie Brandriss, Bob Goodman
SAR Science

Dr. Freitag, the German Consul General, Speaks to Sophomores About "Germany Today and the Holocaust"
Sometimes, more than others, it is clear that the study of history is a means to understanding the present. On Tuesday May 19th the elevator doors opened onto the 6th floor and the entire sophomore grade applauded as Dr. Horst Freitag, the German Consul General stepped out to greet them. Accompanied by his assistant Claudia Gerber and Ms. Harriet Mandel, the Director of Bnai Brith's Global Round Table, Dr. Freitag spoke about "Germany Today and the Holocaust."

This presentation was a part of our study of World War II and the Holocaust and our students were prepared to listen and talk about the complex reality of Modern day Germany. The topics raised included: How has Germany been dealing with its responsibility for the atrocities of the Holocaust? How has the new generation of Germans been impacted by this past? How is German public policy informed by this unique responsibility towards civil rights and fighting xenophobia? Dr. Freitag also referred to the strong alliance between Israel and Germany both in terms of politics as well as joint social and cultural programming. Dr. Freitag spoke candidly about the enduring shame and horror the Germans feel and said that the German government has worked to transform this into a responsibility to educate about the Holocaust, the enduring dangers of hatred, discrimination and the absolute values of democracy and civil rights.

Salute to Israel Parade

On Sunday May 31st, SAR High School and SAR Academy joined together and marched in the Salute to Israel Parade. Sporting stylish purple t-shirts, celebrating 100 years since the founding of Tel Aviv, we marched up Fifth Avenue in impressive fashion. Many thanks to Mr. Friedman, Ms. Weisz, and Mr. Andrews along with their art students for creating the banners and posters which so fittingly and artistically conveyed the theme of Tel Aviv's importance as the first new Jewish city in the modern State of Israel. The weather was perfect and the students were great. We are looking forward to next year's parade already.

The Dybbuk
The SAR Drama Society took on the challenging and thought provoking play, the Dybbuk. With two performances, the actors under the guidance of Mr. Marius Zilberstein did a phenomenal job capturing the conflicts depicted in the monumental play written by S. Ansky in 1914. Originally written in Russian, the play was entitled "Between Two Worlds." The complexity of the play which highlights the conflict between the worlds of rationality and mysticism, modernity and tradition, haskalah and shtetl life, this world and the next as well as many other issues was expertly conveyed by the cast.

With effective use of lighting, the cast conjured an eerie image through the entire play in which the audience became enthralled in the issues being explored. This was the first time that the entire school attended a performance of a Drama Society play during school hours. It was very well received and provoked spirited discussion and analysis. Congratulations to the entire cast of students who worked tirelessly on the entire play including advertising, set design, sound, and lighting and of course acting. Thank you to Mr. Birnbaum and Mr Andrews who contributed mightily and to the director Mr. Marius Zilberstein.