The school will receive its fourth No Place for Hate designation during a ceremony on Sunday, Sept. 11.
In a ceremony on Sunday, the students and staff at the Temple Emanuel Cherry Hill Preschool and Religious School will celebrate the school’s fourth designation as No Place for Hate. Lisa Friedlander, No Place for Hate project director, will attend the ceremony and present the school with its official designation banner.
To earn the distinction, the school formed a No Place for Hate committee, adopted a resolution pledging to create a more inclusive community and implemented a number of projects promoting respect for differences.
Last school year, Temple Emmanuel completed a project called Mr. Mensche Machine. During the year, each time a student did a mitzvah, a commandment or good deed. They would earn a marble to place down Mensche’s funnel. When students did hurtful things, they were asked to write down what they were atoning for on a “Sorry Slip”, place it in Mensche’s mouth, and watch the slip shred, enabling the student to start fresh, and to think about the consequences of their behavior. The goal was to show how meaningful students‟ actions can be in effecting positive change in the school.
In another project named “What Do You Stand For?”, class lessons focused on a different core value each month. Students created art projects to reflect those values, which were displayed in an end of the year art exhibit.
The school’s final project was a mental health/inclusion campaign, which included the creation of an Inclusion Committee and a Task Force on Mental Health. The goal was to make a commitment to inclusion both within the educational realm of classrooms and within the synagogue as a whole. Programming included hands-on projects, guest speakers, group discussion, and an annual expo on mental health.
Temple Emanuel’s Preschool and Religious School is receiving its fourth banner on Sunday. It remains the only synagogue school to receive a No Place for Hate designation in the Anti-Defamation League’s Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware region.
