By Abby Kass
This 2024-2025 school year, 6 new faculty members have joined TLS’s Kehillah. If you’d like to know more about new teachers’ opinions on the school year, check out our article “A Warm Welcome.” Now that school has been in session for almost two months, new faculty members have been able to experience what TLS is like and have had a chance to accustom themselves to their new environment.
Laura Tobin, a new history teacher at TLS, has degrees from Tufts, George Washington, and Columbia. She loves history, especially U.S. history, and spent so much time studying it because it prompts her students to look at overarching themes.
“I like teaching U.S. history because it asks big questions of my students,” Tobin said. “It makes us think about what we care about as American citizens, what we value, what it means to live in a democracy. Those are the big questions I like my students to ask and I love being able to ask those questions and discuss them in the classroom when studying U.S. history.”
One of TLS’s new Tanakh teachers, Bex Stern Rosenblatt, studied Tanakh at Bar Ilan University and has written for many Jewish organizations. Since beginning at TLS, she has been awed by her colleagues’ and students’ continued friendliness and kindness. Additionally, she has gained new perspectives on high school students as she has never taught them before.
“I’ve only ever taught rabbinical students and rabbis, I’ve never taught high school students,” Stern Rosenblatt said. “In the very first couple weeks of school, one of my tenth graders said something about Shemot that blew me away. It is different teaching high school students and Rabbinical students but, teaching high school students, I’m still being blown away by perspectives that students bring to the text.”
In terms of adapting, Tobin is acclimating to her new environment well and has been admiring how TLS encourages giving back to the community and supporting Israel. She also appreciates the help from her fellow teachers in her department in answering any questions she has. She knows it will take time to grow those relationships, but is excited nevertheless for the school year.
“I think that any place you go to in a new job, it takes time to build connections,” Tobin said. “I always say that it takes about a year to feel comfortable in a place. So, I know that it’s a process, and I’m hopeful that through my interactions with students and my colleagues, over time, those connections will deepen and become more meaningful as a whole”.
One of the biggest adjustments Stern-Rosenblatt has had to make is realizing that her students have other classes, and how she shares a space with those teachers from other subjects.
“It’s nice seeing how teachers find their tribe,” Stern-Rosenblatt said. “But, also what happens when you have Tanakh teachers and math teachers and put them in close proximity, and the atmosphere that develops out of that. It also helps me remember that, when you’re my Tanakh students, you’re only my Tanakh students for fifty-five minutes every couple of days.”
Teaching in a Jewish school is a priority for Tobin because she wants to teach at a school that aligns with Jewish values. At TLS, one of the largest values she has seen present is support.
“The teachers are always trying to work with students and provide support throughout different ways,” Tobin said. “Whether it’s social-emotional with deans and psychologists, or through study hall and CAS teachers, I think it shows there is great support in place”.
Another new faculty member, Terry Shaw, joined the TLS’s math department this year and has extensive teaching experience. He has taught in areas such as the South Bronx, Mount Pleasant, and Yorktown. Lately, he became a trustee of the Yorktown Congress of Teachers Welfare Fund, where he helps retired teachers.
One of the values that Stern-Rosenblatt has seen instilled in TLS’s Kehillah is having confidence in students that they can succeed.
“I think that Leffell believes in people for better or for worse,” Stern-Rosenblatt said. “That there’s always another chance for someone, no matter what a student’s reputation was last year or what a student’s reputation was last week, the systems that Leffell has built help the student rather than give up on the student, which is, on the one hand, a challenge, and on the other hand, really nice.”
