Hebrew High School of New England Graduates Largest Class in its History

At the a regional Jewish day school located in West Hartford, each and every one of the 78 students is valued for their individual personalities and talents.

Nowhere was this more evident than at the HHNE 13th annual commencement ceremony, held Sunday at the high school’s new $6.8 million building on Bloomfield Avenue. Approximately 400 family, friends, underclassmen and alumni shared in the joy of the event. During the two-hour ceremony, held in the school's gymnasium, each of the 24 graduates delivered a personal reflection on their experiences at the school.

“Each and every one of you has something important to say,” Dean of Students Rabbi Shimmy Trencher said in his charge to the students. “That’s why we sit through 24 individual speeches.”

Standing on ground level, facing the graduates who were seated on a stage, his voice choked with emotion, Trencher urged the students to “do whatever you can to pursue a life of meaning, rather than a life of pleasure. Choose wisely on how to spend your time,” he said, adding that Judaism teaches God “created each of us for a purpose.”

This year’s graduating class – the school’s largest thus far – was not given a theme for their speeches, which senior Aaron Gelber of Avon said is the school’s “final lesson,” giving them leeway to express their individuality.

Each student tied their speech to a Jewish teaching, some from the Torah, Psalms or from a compilation of ethical teachings called “Pirke Avot” (translated as “Ethics of the Fathers.”)  Many spoke of their close-knit class and thanked their fellow classmates for helping them to mature and to accept diversity. But there were two recurring themes: students' appreciation for their teachers and teachers' willingness to remain a part of their students' lives – outside the classroom.

“HHNE teachers take their students’ growth personally,” said Offir Ben-Naim, who was the recipient of the Avi Lapidus Memorial Scholarship Award for his commitment to Judaism and love of technology. (Avi Lapidus was a freshman at the school when the West Hartford teen died in 2006.) Ben-Naim said he has learned that “by going above and beyond what is expected, you can accomplish great things,” and went on to give examples of ways the faculty at HHNE go beyond the call of duty: meeting students at Starbucks for study groups; making themselves available by phone, or inviting students over for Sabbath dinner on Friday nights.

Justin Brennan, who came to the school as a freshman from the Manchester Public School system, quoted a Jewish saying: “Take yourself a teacher and acquire for yourself a friend,” and noted, “Teachers can become friends, and friends can become teachers.” Hili Moore relocated to West Hartford during the middle of her freshman year and became vice president of the Feminist Society. She served as senior class representative to the Student Government and quoted from Psalms: “From all my teachers I have grown wise.”

There was much pride evident among those gathered in the school’s bright and airy new building. Since its founding in 1996, the school had been housed in a cramped basement at on North Main Street in West Hartford. The new 33,000-square-foot building was built on 11 acres formerly owned by the University of Hartford and opened in the fall of 2010 with major financial support from West Hartford philanthropists Simon and Doris Konover and the Springfield, Mass.-based Harold Grinspoon Foundation. The school now meets in the Grinspoon-Konover Building on the Pava Educational Campus. Jeremy Pava of West Hartford is president of the school.

Approximately fifty-five percent of the graduates will spend a year studying at seminaries in Israel before going to college, according to Beth Duzy, director of guidance. Almost all of the graduates will ultimately attend college--one will serve in the United States Marine Corps. Duzy noted this year, two students were awarded full scholarships to college—Herschel Singer for Yeshiva University’s honors program, and Sarah Scott, who will attend Touro College.

HHNE is the only co-educational, Modern Orthodox, secondary Jewish day school between New York and Boston. It is open to young men and women from across the Jewish denominational spectrum. Students mostly come from the Greater Hartford area (50 percent); Greater New Haven area (13 percent); Western Massachusetts (27 percent); and from outside the region (10 percent). The school day begins at 7:55 a.m. with morning prayer and a community breakfast. The day concludes at 5:18 p.m.

Head of School Rabbi Daniel Loew said the school offers a dual curriculum of Judaic learning and college preparatory studies.  In addition to a rigorous academic program and emphasis on community service, students also participate in a variety of extra-curricular activities, including presentations by the dance and visual arts groups as part of HHNE’s Cultural Arts annual event at the Hartford Stage.

The graduates are as follows: Offir Ben-Naim, Justin Brennan, Jenna Burstein, Yitzchak Edry, Lowell Eitelberg, Aaron Gelber, Naomi Glickman, Joseph Goldberg, Rachel Goldberg, Ethan Goldman, Lacey Goldsher, Nicholas McGee, Kendra Meisler, Hili Moore, Nathaniel Pava, Rachel Salem, Jodie Salzberg, Zachary Schindler-Marren, Talia Schwarzmer, Sarah Scott, Olivia Shestopal, Alex Shragis, Herschel Singer and Sima Weissman.