Motzei Shabbos, February 9Parent/Son Melave Malka POSTPONED due to expected inclement weather. New date TBD Sunday, February 10Rosh Chodesh Adar davening in Lamport Auditorium Tennis Tryouts The Great Debate Monday, February 11Rosh Chodesh Adar davening in Lamport Auditorium KS"A Halacha Shiur w/ free donuts; 9:10am in room 203 Od Yosef Chai Matanos L'Evyonim campaign kicks off Hatzioni meeting during lunch in room 201 Varsity Hockey Lions vs. TABC Storm @ 7:45pm in The Den Tuesday, February 12Navi Kollel to meet in the Beis Midrash during breakfast MTA Chorus practice during lunch in room 404 MTA Band practice during fifth period in the band room JV Basketball Lions @ MDY Warriors, 6:45pm Varsity Basketball Lions @ MDY Warrior, 8:15pm Wednesday, February 13
Hatzioni Donut Sale
Library Squad meeting during lunch in the Library
Chess match @ TABC
Debate meeting, 6pm in the Library
Thursday, February 14
KS"A Halacha Shiur w/ free donuts; 9:10am in room 203
College Bowl match; bus departs 10:15am
Chorus Practice during lunch in room 404
Bnai Aliyah meets Likrat Shabbat during lunch
Band Practice in room 404 during 5th period
Mock Trial opening match; bus departs at 3pm
Mishmar; Dismissal @ 7pm
Friday, February 15 - Monday, February 18
President's Day Weekend, No Sessions
The Henry Wittenberg Wrestling Tournament
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Four Students Named National Merit Scholarship Finalists
 Congratulations to Yosef Sklar, Nathaniel Piskun, Yisroel Snow and Dovid Schwartz on being named National Merit Scholarship Finalists! In addition to our four finalists, another MTA senior, Yisroel Shatz has been selected as a Finalist in National Merit's competition for corporate sponsored scholarships. |
Ebooks Now Offered to MTA Students
Ms. Danielle Lewis, our school librarian, is delighted to announce that the Joseph Alexander Library now makes available to our students and faculty eBooks and audiobooks! Students, faculty and staff can now browse the electronic collection in a variety of subjects including classic fiction, current fiction, and popular nonfiction through this online extension of our physical library. By supporting the school curriculum while helping busy students find time to read, our Overdrive ebook platform provides access to timeless concepts with the latest 21st century tools.
The debut of our ebook library dovetails with the second annual National Digital Learning Day, which took place on Wednesday, February 6. This event celebrates "innovative teaching practices that encourage exploration of digital learning, emphasizing how it can provide students with crucial skill sets and increased opportunities" through successful use of technology in and beyond the classroom. National Digital Learning Day is presented by the Alliance for Excellent Education and other national educational organizations.
The MTA community can access our online OverDrive catalog by clicking on the ebooks icon on the bottom of the Library page of the MTA website. Students have already been provided with usernames and passwords, and they may now check out books in a variety of formats, including Kindle, EPUB, and Kobo.
For more information, please contact Ms. Lewis, Librarian and Learning Center Specialist, at (212) 960-5337, ext. 349 or at dlewis@yuhsb.org. We look forward to sharing this exciting new resource with our students.
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Shai Cohen ('16) Takes First in Annual Shakespeare Competition
by Shimmy Mandelbaum ('16)
MTA's Shakespeare competition kicked off this past Monday. The judges included Mrs. Levitt, Mr. Kulnis, Mrs. Siegfried and an expert in Shakespearean literature... MTAs own Ms. Lewis. After many invigorating and heartfelt speeches from some of William Shakespeare's well renowned plays such as Hamlet, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, Romeo and Juliet and more. the competition was narrowed down to Benjy Lamn ('16), CJ Glicksman ('16), Meir Barg ('16), Zack Kauffman ('13), Shai Cohen ('14) and Daniel Saxon ('13).
The Finals of the competition took place on Thursday with yet another judge, Rabbi Brownstein. This time, the air was tense as the stakes were high. Poetry and speeches from some of Shakespeare's most illustrious plays were filling the room with a sense of joy and sorrow, comedy and soberness. Eventually, after all the emotional speeches, the judges declared Shai Cohen the winner and Zack Kauffman the alternate.
As the winner, Shai will now memorize a sonnet to present at the English Speaking Union competition held at the New York Public Library on 42nd Street. For the past few years, MTA was the only yeshiva to participate in this competition. Two years ago, MTA took first place in the New York State contest. The national winner receives $10,000 and a course at the Globe Theater in London.
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Clothing Drive a Massive Success
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Dovid Baum ('13) and Eli Eisenman ('13) sit proud amongst the hundreds of donated clothing articles
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Since before winter break, Dovid Baum ('13) and Eli Eisenman ('13) have been working tirelessly to coordinate and promote a MTA Clothing Drive to benefit Yad Leah, an organization based out of Israel to provide clothing to those in need. The MTA community responded in force, donating approximately 1,400 articles of clothing!
On Thursday, the bags of clothing were taken to Lamport Auditorium where Rabbi Ciment's Senior shiur - including Ives Herman, Zak Lenik, Seth Kaufman, Joseph Katayev, Ari Shatkin, and Mordy Yager - spent time sorting through the clothing, along with Dovid Ort ('14). Special thanks to Rabbi Schenker who helped get the project started, and to Mr. Dobrick for his guidance. And, of course, thanks to the MTA community for its generosity!
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Students Interview Holocaust Survivors
by Akiva Schiff ('13)
 This week was exciting for the students in the "Names, Not Numbers" program at MTA. This was the week in which, after much preparation, we interviewed the holocaust survivors. Beginning on Monday, and continuing through the week, all of our nine groups had the opportunity to meet and interview the survivors assigned to them. When their turn came, each group greeted their interviewee at the entrance of our school and escorted them up to the interview room. Thee students in each group then alternated leading the interview, asking their pre-formulated questions and recording the powerful answers that they received.  Moshe Bochner interviewed grandparents from both his mother's and father's side, and Noah Shapiro, Moshe Lifschitz, and Zachary Welgrin interviewed a grandparent as well. One survivor brought her yellow star, and another brought his visa photo, which was signed by President Harry Truman. One of the survivor's children came in from Buffalo, NY to hear his tragic story for the first time.
 On Thursday, as a fitting conclusion to our busy week, we had a session with Rabbi Taubes, discussing important theological questions raised by the occurrence of the Holocaust, and some responses that Judaism can offer to them. Each student then got a turn to comment or reflect on the seminar, or on the project as a whole. It was a great chance to hear what each of our classmates took away from this experience. Afterwards, we had a brief discussion about the next step in our project, which will be to edit our recorded interviews into a short movie. We are all looking forward to completing our projects and helping the survivors and the Jewish people as a whole by perpetuating the story of the holocaust, and keeping their memories alive. Thank you to Mrs. Tova Rosenberg and Dr. Cahn for overseeing and guiding this wonderful project for us.
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Saving the World at Yeshiva University's National Model United Nations XXIII
 From Sunday through Tuesday, 18 students, joined by faculty advisor Mr. Shuey Jacoby, traveled to the Stamford Plaza Hotel to participate in YU's 23rd annual Model United Nations Conference. Over 600 Jewish high school students from across North America and beyond (there were students from Brazil and South Africa) came together to debate a range of issues, including women's rights, world health, prevention of nuclear procurement, and many more. MTA students were divided into the delegations from Russia, Botswana, and Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast).
 One of the YU student committee administrators of the Security Council, considered to be the most prestigious of all committees and which Yehuda Brick ('13) was a member of, commented that the students in the committee were amongst the top speakers and thinkers in the country.
Congratulations to the MTA delegation on a job well done!
More pictures available on Flickr. |
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 Ilan Schnitzer ('14), winner of Rabbi Eli Cohn's Fundraiser Raffle prize, along with Alex Kupchick ('14), Dovie Neuberger ('14), and Ezra Teichman ('14) traveled to his home to bake challah.
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LIONS UPDATE
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Wrestling Lions Overcome Lexington School
by Shai Cohen ('14)
This past Tuesday, the MTA Wrestling Team took another exciting win. The Lions wrestled the Lexington School, known for their aggression and skill, in Queens. Aaron Black and Shai Cohen pinned their opponents to boost the team score and secure the win. It was a good, tough match-up between the two schools. The MTA Lions continue to work very hard in preparation for the big Wittenberg Yeshiva Wrestling Invitational next weekend.
Varsity Hockey Lions Suffer Difficult OT Defeat
by Yoni Kram ('13)
On a brutally cold Wednesday night in Washington Heights, the MTA Lions hosted the rival DRS Wildcats in a big game with important playoff implications. The Lions were able to feed off the incredible energy produced by the fans - led by the Makor Chaim exchange students - and were able to score first on a beautiful goal by Akiva Gottlieb. The Lions kept their defensive intensity at a high level throughout the game, holding on to a 1-0 lead throughout the majority of the 3 periods. Unfortunately, with 4:30 left in the game, the Wildcats scored - sending the game into overtime. In overtime, the Lions put up a good fight, but the Wildcats were able to put one past senior Goalie Rami Greenspan (who played a fantastic game) to pull out the win. The Lions hope to rebound Monday Night against the TABC Storm in The Lion's Den. Tough Losses for Junior Varsity Teams
Both JV Basketball and Hockey suffered tough losses this week. The basketball team lost in Brooklyn, to Derech Hatorah, on Monday evening. On Tuesday evening, the hockey team took a 2-1 lead into the 3rd, but gave up 2 quick goals, which they were unable to recover from.
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| "Meet the Israeli Author" Journal Archived |
Hatzioni Presents:
A gift to the needy
A blessing for the environment
Send Leket Israel Purim cards in lieu of Mishloach Manot. 25% of Israelis live below the poverty line.
Hundreds of thousands of tons of nutritious food are destroyed in Israel each year.
Leket Israel is there to rescue the food, delivering it to those who need it most. Your $1 provides 10 people with one lb of fruit and vegetables. 18 cards/envelopes for $36 (1 pack) 36 cards/envelopes for $70 (2 packs) 54 cards/envelopes for $90 (3 packs) 108 cards/envelopes for $170 (6 packs) Buy Purim cards now, get the word out, tell your family and friends... Food Rescue, it's worth making noise about! To order, contact Daniel Goldstein ('13), daggerg18@yahoo.com |
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Download this week's Hebrew version of
Shema Koleinu
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MAZEL TOV!
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Mazel Tov to Dani Weinberger ('09) upon his marriage to Naomi Rabinovich.
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Yisroel Bernson
2/11
Yehoshua Szafranski
2/11
Zak Lenik
2/13
Ezra Quint
2/13
Jesse Tawil
2/16
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Upcoming Events
2/15-2/18 President's Day Weekend, No Sessions
2/21 Ta'anis Esther, Dismissal @ 1:15pm
2/24 Purim, No Sessions
2/28 MTA Blood Drive
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Help Akiva Blumenthal ('12) End EB
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Akiva Blumenthal ('12) will be running in the Jerusalem Marathon with Team Butterfly, a team that benefits the Jackson Gabriel Silver Foundation (JGSF). JGSF raises funds needed for research for the cure of Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB), a disease that Akiva's friend David suffers from.
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