Cultivating Gratitude

by Arnold Zar-Kessler, Head of School

Our Institutional Advancement Office recently ran a wonderful event, Erev Nedevim, graciously hosted by Schechter parents Andy and Rabbi Suzanne Offit. As I stepped away to prepare some remarks, I noticed an interesting book on a table in their library, The Psychology of Gratitude. Leafing through it a bit, my interest was piqued enough to follow-up, and – as you might have guessed – there is, indeed, a growing field of study on the psychology of gratitude, and heretofore left to theologians and moral philosophers.

In the preface to the book, Robert Solomon claims that “psychologists are relative latecomers to study of gratitude…Unlike anger, fear and disgust, gratitude does not seem to qualify as a basic emotion.” Psychologists explain that feelings of gratitude are elicited when one is willing to recognize that they have “been the beneficiary of someone’s kindness.” The cornerstone of gratitude, however, is “undeserved merit,” recognizing that that we did nothing to deserve the gift or benefit; it was freely bestowed. This core feature is reflected in one definition of gratitude as “the willingness to recognize the unearned increments of value in one’s experience.” (Bertocci and Millard, 1963).

The increased attention to gratitude is one of the outcomes of the Positive Psychology movement, to which I’ve referred previously. Positive Psychology is the scientific study of the strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive. The field is founded on the belief that people want to lead meaningful and fulfilling lives, to cultivate what is best within themselves, and to enhance their experiences of love, work, and play. Positive Psychology has three central concerns: positive emotions, positive individual traits, and positive institutions. In this light, gratitude is both a positive emotion and individual trait that enables communities and individuals to thrive.

Many of the contributors to The Psychology of Gratitude argue that being capable of expressing gratitude is not only a virtue, but part and parcel of the good life. It is not just an acknowledgement of debt and expression of humility, but it is also a way to improve one’s life.

I concur with many of the contributors to the book (Hebrew College professor Sol Shimmel amongst them), that a structure that cultivates gratitude helps shape a propensity towards recognizing one’s “undeserved merit,” and expressing it as well. At its core, that is a key goal of religious education.

As it turns out, it seems that the rest of the world is catching up to the transformative power of being thankful. Witness the entries on the newest shelf of the self-help section of your local bookstore, Thanks!, How the New Science of Gratitude can Make You Happier (Emmons, 2007); Gratitude Power for Runners and Walkers (Mahoney, 2011); Even Happier, a Gratitude Journal for Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment (Ben Shahar, 2009); Living in Gratitude, A Journey that Will Change Your Life (Arrien, 2011); and the list continues.

I write that they are “catching up” because there is a book we use  here at Schechter that leads us through daily journeys of gratitude. In the preliminary prayers for the morning service, we note the challenge of just being a mortal being:

“What is our life? What is our strength? What is our goodness? Even the deeds of great people are like nothing.”

“But we are blessed to have tradition, to be part of a people with a covenant.”

“Therefore, we are obliged to thank you, God; how fortunate are we to be able to recite twice daily the Sh’ma.”

It is this construct that our tradition provides, as well as its logical extensions: to recite a hundred blessings a day, to recite blessings when we eat, when we smell different fragrances, when we see a rainbow, or lightening, the ocean, a scholar, or a friend who has recovered from a serious illness – all of these are acts of cultivation of a sense of appreciation. A school that gives children gifts that will last them a lifetime effectively cultivates a deep sense of gratitude, as well.

Another book recommendation for this season is Enjoy Every Sandwich, Living Each Day as if it were Your Last by Lee Lipsenthal. In his introduction to the book, Dr. Dean Ornish writes, “Making every act sacred is what helps us more fully enjoy life… When I was a teenager, I thought ’sacred’ meant ‘boring’… Now I understand sacred is just another way of describing that which is most special.”

Perhaps this week, when you’re sitting around the table with your children, you’ll open up a conversation about what is special in everyone’s life, what constitutes an “undeserved merit” in their lives, and how we express gratitude for the gifts bestowed upon us. The school and parents partner when parents, for example, make sure that their children complete their written homework. That comes with the tuition of any good independent school. But hearing your children share their own understanding of what they are thankful for? Priceless.

We have recently received the latest batch of data on some critical measures of “outcomes” of our program.

First, we received the results of a recent WordMasters Challenge.  For those who may not be familiar, this is an exercise in critical thinking that first encourages students to become familiar with a set of interesting new words (considerably harder than grade level), and then challenges them to use those words to complete analogies expressing various kinds of logical relationships. Working to solve the Challenge analogies helps students to think both analytically and metaphorically. Though most vocabulary-boosting and analogy-solving activities have been created for high school students, the WordMasters materials have been specifically designed for younger students, in grades three through eight. They are particularly well-suited for able and interested children who rise to the challenge of learning new words and enjoy logical puzzles posed by analogies.

Thus, our results should be viewed in context of schools that self-select for this sort of activity. Schools that do not educate “able and interested children” generally do not sign up for this optional competition, which is still entered by approximately 220,000 student nationwide, with well over a 1,000 grade-level teams. To the best of our knowledge, we are the only dual language program willing to participate in this demanding competition.

The WordMasters folks informed us last week that competing in the difficult Blue Division of the Challenge, and coached by Patricia Rigley, our sixth graders tied for eighth place in the nation, in the year’s second meet, held in February, among 409 school teams competing. At the same time, the school’s seventh graders, coached by Donna Cover, placed fifth in the nation among 291 competing teams, and our eighth graders, coached by Rachel Katz, tied for seventh place in the nation among 301 competing teams. It marks the highest combined finish for our teams.

In addition, seven of our students won highest honors for individual achievement. Two fifth graders and five seventh graders earned perfect scores in the meets for their grade levels, while in the country only 51 fifth graders and only 93 seventh graders did so. If my rusty statistics are correct, the chances of any school having five perfect scores in the seventh grade was 0.00335, or three-tenths of a percent. When I mentioned this feat at a recent Hanhallah meeting, I said this was achieved in spite of being a dual language program, and Rabbi Bardack correctly challenged me. “We achieved this outcome precisely because we are dual language school,” she said.

In addition, we received news of our students’ applications to selective independent schools this past week. Our students received acceptances to Beaver Country Day School, Brimmer and May, Boston University Academy, Buckingham Browne & Nichols, Milton Academy, Commonwealth School, Maimonides, Roxbury Latin School, Winsor School, and, of course, Gann Academy. Our acceptance rate to these schools (other than Gann) was approximately 50 percent, better than twice the average admissions rate to these schools, overall. And at Gann, we had a 94 percent admissions rate, significantly higher than the roughly 85 percent admissions rate Gann has reported for overall admission. Factoring in our admissions, it appears that our students were admitted at roughly a 25 percent higher rate than other students.

These are both very, very impressive outcomes and speak to the great work and achievement of our students and our teachers. We now have all sorts of data to show, to explain and frankly, to brag about our program. Yet, I cannot tell you how many times I’ve heard over the past few months questions like “yah, but is our school as good as _____?” (and you can fill in the blank with names like Milton, Park, Rashi, Newton, Brookline, or even Singapore). We’re patient, and we do our best to explain, yet nonetheless, it is interesting to step back and consider what is going on with all the questions about comparative assessment of program, why are folks so interested and why is it so hard to provide data that convinces folks about the quality of the program.

These questions about program assessment are certainly b’shem shamayim (worthy) questions, and I’d like to use this article as the kick-off for a series that will explore some of the background to the broader conversation on what I would call standards-based accountability through the nation, how it applies to independent schools overall, Jewish day schools and our school in particular. At the close of the series, I’ll hold coffee hours at both campuses to continue the conversation with any interested parents.

In closing, I’ll give a preview of the punch line: in a nutshell, we’re not asked the questions about the comparative quality of our program because “things are never good enough;” rather, we are now in an environment in which institutional accountability is (rightfully) a topic throughout society, and schools are a particular focus to this movement.  How we answer the questions will hopefully say a lot about how we view our relationship both to our constituents as well as to the aspirations and visions we claim for ourselves. More to follow.

by Rabbi Scott Slarskey, Grade 6 Torah She’b'al Peh, Upper School Religious Leader

Every time a guest presents at our Friday morning Grades 6-8 minyan – delivering a three- to four-minute Ani Ma’amin statement of personal belief – I remind myself to be patient. I very much enjoy hearing parents, faculty, community leaders, alumni and eighth-grade students speak about the values core to their life choices. But our students have reminded me again and again that the most important transformative moments happen shortly after the conclusion of the speaker’s formal remarks. During the five to seven minutes immediately following the presentation, students – and occasionally faculty – ask the presenter questions about his or her core personal belief.

“Why is it important to do the right thing, even when you know nobody sees you and nobody will find out?”

“What would happen to the State of Israel if every Jew in the world moved there all of a sudden?”

“Why should a person pray if they don’t feel inspired?”

These exemplary questions are paraphrased from actual questions students have asked visitors at our Friday morning Grade 6-8 minyan. This forum for deep questioning fosters students’ critical engagement and identification with, as well as deep understanding of, the formative beliefs of another person.

Excellent questions beget excellent questions. Both peers and faculty unfailingly, and often unconsciously, model the art of asking sensitive, probing, essential questions. Contemporary educational research and theory advocate essential questions as the foundation of excellent educational practice. Internationally known educator and author Grant Wiggins characterizes an essential question as “a question that any thoughtful and intellectually-alive person ponders and should keep pondering.”

In the world around us, we can see how questions weave a web of relationships between people and The Holy Blessed One, hone our understanding of challenging concepts and have the power to significantly alter the public discourse. Please join us for a Friday morning Ani Ma’amin to discover how you will be transformed by the questions of our next generation of Jewish leaders.

by Rabbi Amy Bardack, Lower School Judaic Director

“Students will develop a love of Torah study for its own sake and embrace it as an inspiring resource, informing their values, moral commitments, and ways of experiencing the world.” That is one of the two standards we have committed to as a school, as part of our curricular initiative in Tanakh Standards and Benchmarks. Our goals are for students to derive morals and values from the text and develop skills to understand the Biblical text in Hebrew. Now in our second year of this initiative, all teachers in grades 2-8 are designing standards-based curricular units.

Here is a taste of the kinds of morals and values students discuss in second and third grade, in connection with the texts they study from Sefer Bereshit:

Lying:

Having studied about the brothers lying to their father about having sold Yosef, third graders reflect on the effects that lying can have on others. They also consider circumstances in which lying could be seen as an acceptable choice.

Forgiveness:

Studying about Yosef forgiving his brothers, third graders reflect on the difficulty of forgiving those who have hurt us. They consider what is involved in being able to forgive.

Seeking Peace:

Learning about Avraham’s concern about a peaceful separation from Lot, second graders discuss the importance of maintaining peace between people. Students think of times in their lives when they can be peace-makers, such as on the playground when conflicts arise.

Standing Up for What is Right:

Second graders study about Avraham arguing with God on behalf of the people of Sodom, including the key quote: “Will the Judge of All the World not act with justice?” They reflect on the importance of standing up for what they believe is right and the risks involved in doing so. They identify which injustices they would consider standing up for.

Discussing these kinds of morals and values helps students to develop skills in higher order thinking, which they can apply to all learning. The values are derived from the texts in the Torah, yet they are also applicable to other texts students might read and to their daily lives. Students see that the Torah can be a source of enduring truths about life, and that in turn motivates their learning. In designing curricular units with this standard in mind, we are enriching and deepening our students’ thinking and helping them develop a love of Torah study, which we hope will last a lifetime.

[This post was originally written and published in Schechter's Shavuon on November 30, 2009.]

Today is the yahrzeit of Solomon Schechter z”l. In our tradition, we celebrate the lives of those who made a lasting impact by remembering the date of their passing rather than their birth. By so doing, we honor the accomplishments of lives well lived as opposed to births, when lives were yet to be shaped.

Solomon Schechter, for whom more than 70 schools, seminaries and institutions worldwide dedicated to Jewish learning are named, was a Romanian and English rabbi, academic scholar and educator. He is most famous for his roles as founder and president of the United Synagogue of America, president of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, and architect of the American Conservative Jewish movement.

Schechter was born in Romania in 1847 to a Chassidic family. His Chassidic upbringing did not satisfy him, and in 1879, he went to study at the Berlin Hochschule fur die Wissenschaft des Judentums and at the University of Berlin. In 1882, Schechter was invited to be a tutor in rabbinics in London. He quickly rose to prominence as a rabbinic scholar and spokesman for Jewish traditionalism. In 1890, he was appointed lecturer in Talmudics and in 1892, reader in rabbinics at Cambridge University. In 1899, he also became professor of Hebrew at University College, London.

He gained international fame as a scholar when he discovered and brought back to London more than 100,000 pages of rare manuscripts from the Cairo Geniza. Beyond sorting and filing the documents, Schechter wrote about the newly found Ben Sirach materials.

In the early 1880s, a number of American Jewish leaders tried to establish a seminary and movement, but they found very little support. The Reformers weren’t interested, nor were the new Russian immigrants. In 1902, Rabbi Schechter was invited to become president of a newly revamped school, the Jewish Theological Seminary (JTS). Schechter accepted the invitation and succeeded in attracting an outstanding group of scholars to teach. The JTS became a recognized center of Jewish learning.

In 1913, Schechter was instrumental in founding the United Synagogue of America, the umbrella organization of all Conservative congregations. Though a staunch traditionalist, Schechter admitted there could be change in modern Judaism. However, he felt changes should not be introduced arbitrarily or deliberately. Rather, “the norm as well as the sanction of Judaism is the practice actually in vogue. Its consecration is the consecration of general use—or, in other words, of Catholic Israel.”

In the hallways of both of our schools, candles are lit today beneath a picture of Schechter. Adjoining the picture, Dr. David Starr, parent, teacher and Schechter scholar, wrote, “Schechter’s thought overwhelmingly reveals a man wrestling with the categories implicit in ‘tradition and modernity.’ The history of Schechter’s Seminary, as it came to be known, reveals his willingness to act in such a way as to seize the vital center of Jewish life. The impact on American Jewry was palpable. Through his presence, his writings and through the Seminary and its affiliates, American Jewry now had a center and the beginnings of a high culture at once rooted in traditional texts, as well as versed in modern methods of scholarship.”

It is the commitment to developing, cultivating and strengthening that vital center that this school and the network of Schechter schools across the nation and around the world share. It is because of his vision and leadership that we maintain our mission to build the core of the next generation of the Jewish community and, we believe, its leaders.

As in prior years, today I wore a beard, in the fashion of Schechter, and spoke with classes about the school’s namesake. I hope to help our students see that the school they attend honors a man and his vision – for seriousness of purpose, a commitment to honor tradition, a readiness to engage the world in which we live, and participation as a link in a community that stretches both into the past and forward as far as the mind’s eye can see. May our work, and the work of our students, continue to help Schechter’s memory be a blessing.

by Varda Ben-Meir, Grades 7 & 8 Head Advisor, Grades 4-8 Head of Judaic Studies

At the beginning of the year, the theme of the year was announced: Respect. What is respect?

The dictionary gives the following definitions: admiration given by others; moral sentiments. It is synonymous with honor, appreciation, esteem, recognition.

Respect means recognizing that all people are entitled to basic human dignity. All human beings deserve respect as a basic part of their existence. Confucius said: “Respect yourself and others will respect you.”

Our sense of self-respect begins at birth and continues throughout our lives. It is a learned condition. As babies, we learn to respect our parents, who provide us with our needs. If we are treated with love and esteem, then there is a good chance our self respect will be great and we will succeed in life.

The best way to teach respect is to show respect. When a child experiences respect, he/she knows how it feels and begins to understand its importance. A respectful child takes care of belongings and responsibilities and gets along with peers.

Schools teach children about respect, but parents have the most influence on how respectful children become. Until children show respect at home, it’s unlikely they will show it anywhere else.

What and how do we, at Schechter, teach our students respect? In language arts classes, the students deal with the concept when it is relevant to the story. In fourth grade, they have a box named “Respect.” Slowly, the students uncover the meaning/inner message of the box. In fifth grade, the set of class rules, which include respect one another and respect one another’s property, is in front of the class and glued to the students’ homework folder. The students are daily reminded about and talked to about respect.

In Judaic studies, it is part of the curriculum. During Tanakh classes, one can find many opportunities to teach respect for others and for property. Our seventh graders learn about respecting teachers and students in Toshba. In Hebrew classes, students learn and practice respectful behavior: working with a classmate you are not so friendly with; listening to another student’s presentation; welcoming new students to the grade. In Havurah, seventh graders watch a DVD and discuss bullying. Respect for the school property is a theme that repeats itself throughout the years, and the concept of Derekh Eretz has become part of all of us.

The yearly theme gives us a common language and opportunity to emphasize a behavior we would like to foster in our students.

In a recent Talmud class, our teacher, Rabbi Benjamin Samuels, made a reference to a field of study new to me – the art of memory or Ars Memorativa (Latin). This general term designates a loosely associated group of mnemonic principles and techniques used to organize memory impressions, improve recall and assist in the combination and invention of ideas. It is sometimes referred to as mnemotechnics. It is an art in the Aristotelian sense – a method or set of prescriptions that adds order and discipline to the pragmatic, natural activities of human beings. It has existed as a recognized group of principles and techniques since as early as the middle of the first millennium B.C.E. and was usually associated with training in rhetoric or logic. But variants of the art were employed in other contexts, particularly religious and magical.

The Art of Memory is also the title of a 1966 non-fiction book by British historian Frances A. Yates. The book follows the history of mnemonic systems from the classical period of Simonides of Ceos in ancient Greece to the Renaissance era of Giordano Bruno, ending with Gottfried Leibniz and the early emergence of the scientific method in the 17th century.

In our Talmud class, Rabbi Samuels explained that in the period before the advent of publishing, even in its crudest forms, there were very few books. People committed to memory what needed to be remembered, saved or passed down. Thus, gaining skill in memory was valued, and the art of memory developed and was honed over centuries. As books became more available, the compelling reason to strengthen memory faded. Much of what was needed could be found by going to a library or checking an encyclopedia or the volumes at home or in the office.

Thus, development of the art of memory began to fade by the 18th century. A fictional account, Alfred Hitchcock’s famous 1935 movie, The 39 Steps, opens with a demonstration of the superlative powers of recall of Mr. Memory, a man with a photographic memory, at a London music hall theatre when shots are fired. This demonstration of memory probably hearkens back to a time when memory mattered, and feats of memory inspired.

But does memory matter today, and will it matter going forward? If the decline of the art of memory can be traced to the growth and flourishing of the printed word and thus the capacity to store knowledge outside of one’s self or a human brain, then it seems inevitable that this decline can only be accelerated with the growth of electronic memory systems that can store vast amounts of knowledge, easily available with only the most modest of techniques for locating that data.

For example, parts of this blog were taken directly from Wikipedia; the author really didn’t have to know or remember very much to compose it. This may all be well and good for short essays like this, but is the recession of memory really an attractive prospect? If adults (and by extension, the next generation of adults) really needn’t remember anything (except their passwords, or where their passwords are stored), then isn’t something – beyond simply the art of memory – lost?

Are we just showing our age and lack of a contemporary approach when we get gratification from remembering the words to a poem long ago taught and committed to memory? Or the rules for the proper use of a flag, required to graduate from elementary school? Or the complete lineup of the 1959 Chicago White Sox in the World Series? What should children be asked to remember? Only approaches to accessing information? Or vague first principles?

I suggest that our lives are enriched by what we remember, and – more to the point – that we do remember. With that understanding, memory is an aspect, a function, perhaps even a craft, if not an art form, that can be nurtured and cultivated. If our vision of an educated person stands as our guide, then schools should not abandon the goal of developing memory – both deep and specific – in their work with children.

When the art of memory is lost, it may well be that the beauty and power of remembering might be lost, as well. The task of educators is to understand what endures and thus to envision what might endure for children in our care. To that point, we should labor so that memory itself is not a lost art.

I had the chance recently to visit the Hebrew Language Academy, a publicly-funded charter school that is distinguished by its intensive teaching of Hebrew to children of various backgrounds.  The school – now in its second year of operation – is located in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn and boasts around 225 students, K-2.

The folks at the school were lovely – gracious to guests and ready to answer any and all questions that might come up.  The teachers, likewise, were a dedicated group, pleased to have visitors but always maintaining the focus on the learning of the children in their care.

What is at first most striking about a Jewish educator’s encounter with HLA is the presence of so many minority students.  My hunch is that somewhere between 40 and 50% of the students in classes are either African-American or Hispanic.  It may give one pause (especially when so many of us consider Hebrew to be a sacred language of the Jews) to consider why so many families would opt for a school that intensively teaches Hebrew.  The answer becomes clear rather quickly. Minority parents, like parents everywhere, want the best for their children, and charter schools – including HLA – offer the promise of dedicated teachers, a longer school day, a longer school year and higher standards overall.  And since there is a strict separation of religious content (read none) from the curriculum, non-Jewish parents can happily enroll their children at the school.

The questions of a day school educator is less about what prompts non-Jewish parents to enroll at a school like this than what prompts Jewish parents to do so, and if the presence of schools such as this one (and others in Florida, New Jersey, California, Arizona and more on the way) poses a threat to day schools like ours.

Certain aspects of the program might be quite attractive to families currently enrolled at Schechter schools. Israeli parents, for example, might appreciate the focus on Hebrew language, and some may actually prefer the absence of religious instruction – no prayer, no bible, no requirements for kipot, etc.  There are some who would see the presence of a diverse student body as a plus; their children are part of the wider, “real” world.  Finally, most parents would appreciate the lack of cost for such a program.  Whatever the tuition is in our schools – $10,000, $15,000, $20,000 a year or more – zero dollars is a constant that only becomes more attractive each year.

But our schools are mission-based schools.  We aim to develop students who “will become self-confident, compassionate, practicing Jews” (emphasis added) and who “are connected to the Jewish people and the land of Israel.”  We also seek to “nurture lives rooted in Jewish tradition and Torah.”  In other words, we have set our sights on being a critical part of building the Jewish future, founded on a literate and capable core that will likely stand at the center of whatever the Jewish future brings.  HLA and other schools have other sights – inclusion, comfort in diversity and a strong grasp of the Hebrew language.  Any Jewish future building can take place outside of school hours (and outside of the school setting) – perhaps in an enrichment program, perhaps at home, perhaps not at all.

Certainly we are not distinguished from HLA by the quality of its language program. (Indeed, the program, Hebrew at the Center, is the exact same program we use at Schechter. In some ways, their program is modeled after ours.)  But we are distinguished in the differing ambitions we have for our schools and for the future we hope to help shape.

The key question, the key unknown, of course, is how the market will respond in the coming years.  Will there be substantial enough populations of Jewish parents who will resonate with the mission and vision of schools like ours?  Or will the amelioration of a passion to create a new Jewish future take hold and the attractions of simply being part of a diverse universe with a strong second language (and at no cost!) be enough for parents to feel that they’ve effectively provided for their children’s Jewish education. The market operates under its own wisdom. What schools like ours can do is to do our work as close to flawlessness as we can, cognizant of the challenges developing around us and likely becoming less resistant to our competition, but better focused on what can potentially make us great.

Dr. Mindy Pincus is falling in love—with a school and the children in it. The highly regarded educational leader, who holds a doctorate with honors in counseling psychology and previously served as head of a school in Miami, became the Lower School Principal this fall at Solomon Schechter Day School of Greater Boston. “This is a school where there is such an emphasis on teaching and learning—where it’s valued,” says Dr. Pincus. “And there are great teachers, who are dedicated and so hard working.”

At Schechter, a Jewish day school in Newton with 466 students in grades K-8 and a comprehensive curriculum in both secular and Judaic studies, Dr. Pincus has set several priorities. At the top of her list are ongoing professional development for the faculty and continuing curricular development to ensure that each student receives an outstanding education that is engaging, challenging and supportive. She is committed to doing this within the underlying framework of derekh eretz, the Hebrew phrase for “way to act,” which is characterized by courteous, respectful behavior that enables all members of the school community to function together in an environment of mutual respect, trust and appreciation.

Dr. Pincus is a strong advocate for creating a culture of reading, both at home and at school. “Everywhere I go, I tell parents that children have to read,” she says. “Reading plays an integral role in our growth, both as individuals and as students. Nothing should match the enjoyment of reading a great book.”

“The literacy program in our Lower School is excellent,” she continues. “Through a multifaceted approach, teachers create a literacy-rich environment where time spent reading independently or being read to as a group is highly valued.” She urges parents to be a role model for literacy by reading their own books, newspapers or magazines while their child reads or looks at books next to them.

The selection of Dr. Pincus as Lower School Principal followed an extensive nationwide search by the school’s Board of Trustees and administration. “Dr. Pincus is a clear, consistent communicator who always keeps the highest standards for herself and others around her,” says Arnold Zar-Kessler, Head of School. “She is an outstanding leader who understands the opportunities and challenges of a Lower School.”

Before coming to Schechter, Dr. Pincus was the Head of School for the past seven years of Temple Beth Am Day School in Mimi, FL. She holds a Ph.D. degree with honors in counseling psychology from the University of Miami School of Education, an Ed.M. degree in school counseling from Boston University’s School of Education, and a B.A. degree in English literature from Swarthmore College. During her 25-year career in education, she has served as Director of Counseling at Ransom Everglades School, Coconut Grove, FL; Assistant Head of School and Director of Student Services and Academic Affairs at Roland Park Country School, Baltimore, MD; and teacher and JV girls’ tennis coach at the Hackley School, Tarrytown, NY.

She and her husband, Rich Wagman, currently reside in Wellesley. They have two children, Emily Wagman, who attends Middlebury College, and Matthew Wagman, who is a freshman at the Williston Northampton School.

“Dr. Pincus has the experience, know-how and passion to help us continue our record of educational excellence and proceed to the next level of teacher growth and student learning,” concludes Zar-Kessler.