Every year students at the Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy are greeted on the first day of school by faculty and staff. This year they were also greeted with some structural changes aimed at helping the school balance its budget.
“Along with our new programs and new staff, I am extraordinarily pleased with physical changes made to our facility,” Head of School Howard Haas said. “We added rooms and we are utilizing our space better than ever before. Our library is in a newly remodeled space by the kindergarten room and, for the first time, we have a computer lab in the upper school. These positive moves facilitate a considerable reduction in rent, which is a significant step toward balancing our budget.”
Now beginning his fifth year at the school, Haas said he continues “to feel extremely positive toward our role in educating our students and community.”
The school’s library was previously located in the lobby of the Jewish Community Campus. The art room and the computer lab are no longer in the building’s basement. The art room is now on the first floor and the computer lab is on the second floor.
Numbers are growing
Haas is also excited that all indications are the community day school’s enrollment will be bigger than last year. Last week Tamara Lawson Schuster, director of admission, said she can’t say yet exactly what those figures are as they change every day. However last year’s enrollment stood at 232 students.
“This is wonderfully positive news,” Haas said. “Our kindergarten class is strong with 28. So in this time of economic catastrophe, our numbers are growing.”
Schuster said HBHA is happy with its current retention rate.
“In the past, HBHA would have significant attrition going from the different school divisions — going from lower school to middle school and from middle school to upper school. This year all of our students in fifth grade stayed and moved on to sixth grade (middle school), except for one who is moving out of the country,” Schuster said. Two students, however, have chosen not to advance from eighth grade to high school.
The school is also appealing to families who had started their children in public school.
“This year we have five new fifth graders, as well as two new eighth-graders and seventh-graders,” Schuster said.
Expanded programs
Principal Gayle Gray said the staff is very excited about changes made to the music program. Before this year, the lower school music program was simply choral music based in the teaching of Jewish songs.
“We wanted to expand that to cover more general music,” Gray said.
A new music teacher was hired just before school started to teach general music. Lower school students will meet with that teacher once a week. They will continue learning Jewish music from Devra Lerner once a week as well.
“We are going to be giving more opportunities for students in the area of performing, creating and listening to music with understanding,” Gray said. “We will be creating a comprehensive and sequential music education program that aligns with state and national standards and benchmarks.”