7th Graders Get the Jewish Baltimore 101 Tour

Last week, our 7th grade students toured much of “Jewish Baltimore,” exploring and learning how Jewish Baltimoreans are helping to shape Jewish life in our community. We started our morning with Hatzalah of Baltimore, a Jewish volunteer ambulance and paramedic corps. Dr. Eli Goldstein demonstrated why such an organization is so important in our community. He explained the history of Hatzalah and how its operation works. Our students got a sample training class, and then toured one of Hatzalah’s state-of-the-art ambulances.

Yehudit V. was impressed by Hatzalah’s response time – on average, just two and half minutes! “Baltimore city medics don’t get there that fast,” she points out. Joey S. enjoyed learning about how Hatzalah “saves people’s lives every day on their own time. What they’re doing is a really big mitzvah and I respect and honor what they’re doing.”

We then proceeded to the Center for Jewish Education (CJE), Jewish Community Services (JCS) and the JCC. Here, former BT Judaics Teacher Ms. Leora Pushett shared how these three agencies of THE ASSOCIATED: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore, are meeting Jewish needs throughout the community by both sharing and reinforcing Jewish values across the services they provide.

Soon after, we met with Rabbi Mayer Kurcfeld, Assistant Director of Supervision at the Star-K, who explained how seemingly benign food can be unkosher and the need for proper kosher supervision is a must. Students and teacher alike were mesmerized by his wealth of kosher knowledge. Rabbi Kurcfeld displayed his ritual slaughter knives and demonstrated how to make sure they were in accordance to Jewish Law, which tied in nicely with our 7th Grade Mishna curriculum. After just finishing learning about kashrut, we now had the chance to ask any of our questions to the expert himself!

With our day still only half done, we moved on to meet Chaveirim, a Jewish volunteer organization that offers both home and road-side emergency assistance. Here we met Mr. Avraham Feldman, who shared what a typical day is for Chaveirim, and told us some wild anecdotes of calls he received for help. We then had the chance for hands on learning: tire changing and lock-popping! We all had a blast with that.

Alyse M. enjoyed the hands-on aspect of this stop. “They gave us a car jack so we could take off and change a tire,” she reports. “I got to use the drill to take out the tire bolts.” More beneficial than these newly acquired skills was the lesson about altruism behind it. Said Dahlia S., “It shows how people take their own time to help out a friend in need, even though they may not know the person.”

After a tasty lunch of pizza, French fries, soda and ice cream at Eden Cafe, we were energized for an afternoon filled with continuous fun. We headed over to Ahavas Yisrael, Baltimore’s Kosher Food Pantry. Food Distribution Director Mr. Jeffrey Coleman described how volunteers pack kosher for Baltimore’s hungry every week, delivering packages in an anonymous fashion to uphold and respect our brethren’s honor. We toured their warehouse, where some of our 7th graders are planning to help pack on a Thursday night soon.

Last, but not least, we headed to Ner Israel Rabbinical College. Here, the boys and girls parted for different experiences. The girls went to the home of Mrs. Russi Steinhardt, who recounted what her life was like growing up in an all-Jewish learning community. The girls found their “girls talk” both powerful and moving, then concluded their trip with a walking tour of Ner Israel with Rabbi Oberstein.

The boys began their Ner Israel leg of their trip with Mincha, davening with 350 Ner Israel students, which was pretty “awesome.” Rabbi Soskil then led a walking tour, showing us the ins and outs of the campus—and checked out the dorm rooms too. We then met the Dean of the School, Rabbi Feldman, who spoke to us for a few minutes and gave us the chance to ask him a few questions, too.

Overall, the day was very busy. We learned a lot. We grew from their stories. We learned from the volunteers. It’s amazing how regular people can make such a big impact on our community. We learned how people with different talents and strengths can help and give in their own unique way.