Way to go to our SJA Lions on a great start to the middle school soccer season! The 5-6 team is two for three, and the 7-8 team opened the season with a tie followed by two wins.
We’re proud of the hard work, growth, and ruach our students bring to the field as part of the Smith Jewish Academy athletics program, which gives students the opportunity to compete, learn teamwork, and build confidence and resilience.
Go, Lions! 🦁
We’re proud of the hard work, growth, and ruach our students bring to the field as part of the Smith Jewish Academy athletics program, which gives students the opportunity to compete, learn teamwork, and build confidence and resilience.
Go, Lions! 🦁
"We feel confident that the education and values our children are gaining at Smith will prepare them not only to navigate challenges, but to be sources of light wherever they go."
Head to our blog (smithja.org/article/3007687) to read about why Smith parents Michelle and Aaron Goldstein choose Smith Jewish Academy and how their children are finding themselves and taking ownership of their learning.
Each Wednesday, Davening and Donuts brings Smith families together for joyful, pluralistic prayer before school. During this week of Chol HaMoed Sukkot, we also had the special opportunity of shaking the lulav and etrog, a mitzvah for the holiday of Sukkot 🍋🌿
Thank you to the PTO for a fun Pizza in the Hut, bringing everyone together for good food, good friends, and arts and crafts — and to participate in the mitzvah of dwelling in the sukkah. Chag sameach!
✨ What if one of the most important things we can teach our children is how to be a good friend?
✨ How do we help children build friendships that are healthy, meaningful, and resilient?
✨ And when friendship gets complicated, how do we know when to step in — and when to let them work it out?
These are the questions at the heart of Or l’Derekh: Ideas That Illuminate, SJA’s speaker series exploring the ideas and challenges that shape our children’s lives.
𝗦𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗮𝘆, 𝗡𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝟴 | 𝗥𝗲𝗰𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗮𝘁 𝟲 𝗽.𝗺. | 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗺 𝗮𝘁 𝟳 𝗽.𝗺.
Join us for an evening conversation with Julie Rainer, M.Ed., and Nina Badzin. What questions do you have about helping children navigate friendship?
Submit yours in advance, and it may become part of the conversation.
Register now and join the conversation! Go to smithja.org/page/or-lderekh
A favorite of the Smith community is our kindergarten/eighth grade buddy program! Our youngest and oldest students share a special year-long partnership, where eighth graders become mentors and friends to kindergarten students, building community across grades.
For our youngest students, it’s a chance to feel known, supported, and connected. For our eighth graders, it’s an opportunity to lead with kindness and responsibility, and be a mensch.
For our youngest students, it’s a chance to feel known, supported, and connected. For our eighth graders, it’s an opportunity to lead with kindness and responsibility, and be a mensch.
MEET THE SPEAKERS
Friendship can be one of childhood’s greatest joys — and one of its biggest challenges. This November, we’re bringing together two voices who understand the social world our children navigate every day.
📚 Julie Rainer, M.Ed., is a school counselor, educator, author, parent, and friendship educator with more than 20 years of experience working with students from pre-K through twelfth grade. Her work focuses on helping young people recognize unhealthy friendship dynamics, navigate conflict and exclusion, and build stronger, healthier relationships.
🎤 Nina Badzin is an SJA alumni parent and host of the top 1% podcast Dear Nina: Conversations About Friendship. Through her podcast and newsletter, Nina has become a nationally recognized voice on friendship and social connection, exploring how we create, maintain, repair, and sometimes let go of relationships.
Together, Julie and Nina will explore an important question: How can we help children build the skills and confidence they need to form and sustain healthy relationships?
Join us for the second annual Or l'Derekh: Ideas That Illuminate Speaker Series on Sunday, November 8. Learn more at smithja.org/page/or-lderekh!
We partnered with Youth Frontiers to help encourage our students to build a school culture rooted in timeless core values.
Youth Frontiers spent a day with our fourth and fifth graders empowering them to lead with honor, courage, and kindness at school and beyond. It was a day of dynamic character building where every student leveled up in their menschlichkeit, one of our own core values!
Youth Frontiers spent a day with our fourth and fifth graders empowering them to lead with honor, courage, and kindness at school and beyond. It was a day of dynamic character building where every student leveled up in their menschlichkeit, one of our own core values!
As we prepare for Yom Kippur, our school gathered as a community to reflect and look ahead. We wrote down our individual reflections — a regret from the past year on the inside and a resolution for 5787 on the outside — and joined them together in a chain representing all of our hopes and intentions to be our best selves in the new year. G'mar chatimah tovah — a good final sealing.
First grade is ready for the final shofar blast on Yom Kippur!
Our first graders brought Jewish ritual to life by building working paper-mache kazoo shofars in the Smith Makerspace. T'kiah g'dolah!
You and your family are invited to explore our Smith Jewish Academy Makerspace curriculum! Participate in child-centered activities and create meaningful connections with current and future Smith families.
RSVP at facebook.com/share/1BUaUvJa51/
RSVP at facebook.com/share/1BUaUvJa51/
Nothing says experiential learning like stepping into the roles of a bee colony, from the queen bee and drones to the worker bees and their many jobs. 🐝
Tied to Rosh Hashanah's symbol of honey, our fifth graders welcomed biologist and educational beekeeper Dganit Eldar for an exploration of the vital role bees play as pollinators in a thriving ecosystem.
Rosh Hashanah is the Head of the Year and also a Day of Remembrance. As we commemorate 9/11 and celebrate the new year, we honor the heroes and lives lost by choosing unity and goodness in the year ahead.
Kol hakavod (all honor/good job) to the Smith sixth graders for leading the school in a tekes (ceremony) to honor the 25th anniversary of 9/11 and prepare our community for Rosh Hashanah and Shabbat.
Shanah tovah u'metukah — Wishing you a good and sweet new year!
Kol hakavod (all honor/good job) to the Smith sixth graders for leading the school in a tekes (ceremony) to honor the 25th anniversary of 9/11 and prepare our community for Rosh Hashanah and Shabbat.
Shanah tovah u'metukah — Wishing you a good and sweet new year!
Our first graders and kindergartners are getting a head start on wishing everyone a shanah tovah — a good year — in art class.
Shanah tovah u'metukah! 🍎🍯
Can you believe 2019’s kindergarten buddies are now eighth grade buddies?!
These little kids are now paying it forward as mentors to our 2027 kindergartners, guiding them into the routine and community of Smith Jewish Academy.
These little kids are now paying it forward as mentors to our 2027 kindergartners, guiding them into the routine and community of Smith Jewish Academy.
Our very own Maayan Scholder, our Hebrew Language Coordinator at Smith Jewish Academy, is featured on the Minneapolis Jewish Federation’s September "From The Desk Of with Jim Cohen & Co." podcast!
She joins MJF CEO Jim Cohen and Minnesota Hillel’s Dylan Singer for a thoughtful conversation about Yom Kehillah, a day that brought Jewish educators and professionals from across the Twin Cities together to strengthen Israel education. They explore the importance of creating space for honest and nuanced conversations about Israel, drawing on personal experiences to deepen learning, and helping young people build meaningful connections to Israel from an early age.
We’re excited to see Maayan bringing her experience and perspective to this important conversation and representing Smith Jewish Academy in the broader Jewish community. Give the podcast a listen!
Spotify ➡️ bit.ly/mjf-spotify-podcast
YouTube ➡️ bit.ly/mjf-youtube-podcast
She joins MJF CEO Jim Cohen and Minnesota Hillel’s Dylan Singer for a thoughtful conversation about Yom Kehillah, a day that brought Jewish educators and professionals from across the Twin Cities together to strengthen Israel education. They explore the importance of creating space for honest and nuanced conversations about Israel, drawing on personal experiences to deepen learning, and helping young people build meaningful connections to Israel from an early age.
We’re excited to see Maayan bringing her experience and perspective to this important conversation and representing Smith Jewish Academy in the broader Jewish community. Give the podcast a listen!
Spotify ➡️ bit.ly/mjf-spotify-podcast
YouTube ➡️ bit.ly/mjf-youtube-podcast
💙💛 This Labor Day, we honor our amazing teachers, staff, and administration, who bring Smith Jewish Academy to life everyday, ensuring our students are known, challenged, supported, and inspired. Thank you to all the dedicated people at SJA! 💛💙
Shabbat Shalom!
With our Kabbalat Shabbat services, we welcome in Shabbat and wish our Smith community a peaceful and joyful Shabbat and long weekend.
With our Kabbalat Shabbat services, we welcome in Shabbat and wish our Smith community a peaceful and joyful Shabbat and long weekend.
Learning is underway at SJA!
From hands-on exploration and critical thinking across subjects to meaningful Jewish learning, our students are already diving into a year filled with curiosity, connection, and growth.
From hands-on exploration and critical thinking across subjects to meaningful Jewish learning, our students are already diving into a year filled with curiosity, connection, and growth.
Kindergarten teacher Jenny Palmer has another talent to add to her résumé: 🥇 award-winning baker 🥇! Jenny took home a blue ribbon at the Minnesota State Fair for her cookies — along with 3rd, 4th, and 5th place ribbons for other entries.
Read more community accomplishments, a welcome to the new school year, and more in the August Inside the Pride community newsletter!
Check your inboxes or head smithja.org/page/inside-the-pride. Want to join our email list? Email frontdesk@smithja.org.
Read more community accomplishments, a welcome to the new school year, and more in the August Inside the Pride community newsletter!
Check your inboxes or head smithja.org/page/inside-the-pride. Want to join our email list? Email frontdesk@smithja.org.
