Dear VTT Community,

It has been wonderful to welcome all our students and families to school this week. After an intense summer of renovations and reconfigurations, we opened our school with an enrollment of 508 students, with new enrollees in every grade. This increase in our student body is one more reason why our Capital Campaign to expand our campus is so imperative. There is a demand for high quality Jewish day school education. We intend to meet this need now and for many generations to come with an expanded and modernized premises offering the very best in pedagogical practice and Jewish learning.


A few major changes occurred over the summer, the most significant being the addition of our portable Grade 4 classrooms. For the last five years, we have rented space for overflow classes from Congregation Beth Israel. With their upcoming demolition and reconstruction, we brought Grade 4 back to our main campus through the construction of four portable classrooms that now form a new wing to the school.


The portable classrooms are fresh, modern and spacious and, in the short-term, will ensure our students have an environment which will support their learning. However, with a school built for 450 students, and with enrollment at 508 this year, the portable classrooms do not address over-capacity issues within the campus as a whole--they only replace capacity that we previously had at Congregation Beth Israel. Further, their location on site restricts our ability to enhance the play area for the long-term. The planned expanded and revitalized VTT will meet both current and future programming needs, and has been designed with overall site efficiency and space maximization as critical priorities to address. The portable classrooms were never considered as part of the overall campus design for the future. However, we are pleased to report that the project was managed both on-time and on-budget and demonstrates our commitment to fiscal prudence and effective stewardship of our donors' gifts, which is how we will continue to manage design and construction for the VTT Campus Campaign project moving forward.

The second major change was the creation of our Learning Commons (once known as the library). In order to maximize our current space and to create a more dynamic, vibrant learning hub accessible to students, classes and families, VTT has evolved the former library space into a learning commons model, a multimedia lab space including 25 desktop computers, collaborative learning tables, an expanded circulation/ technology resource/ research help desk, flexible seating space, Apple TV, reading corner and quiet study room. Though open for only the last three days, our students are loving the new space. Parents and students are welcome to use the learning commons after school every day, and students in Grades 4-7 can independently (and quietly) work there until 4:30 daily. (See more photos of learning in action here.)

The media lab is now the multipurpose room and will be used for meetings, work space and some specialty classes.

If you haven't yet seen any of these spaces, please stop by for a visit.

Shabbat Shalom!

Cathy Lowenstein
Head of School