Commencement 2024

Mordy Singer '24

Good evening graduates and families. This Shabbat we will read from the first parsha of the book of Bamidbar. As many of you know, Bamidbar means “in the wilderness.” This book is more focused on the journey than it is on the destination. The Israelites have received the Torah at Sinai, but are not yet entering the promised land. Instead they find themselves traveling through the unknown in the hopes of finding the land of their ancestors. As they start their travels, they have very little in material assets; their main strength as a people is the community they have built and the lessons they have learned while leaving Egypt.

Parashat Bamidbar is the very beginning of this journey. Before leaving the wilderness of Sinai, God speaks to Moses, saying, “take a census of the whole Israelite community” (Numbers 1:2). This is a very important logistical decision. Before getting under way, the Israelites must prepare for the long journey ahead of them. Each tribe must know who will be able to fight, where they should camp, and who is responsible for the rituals and furnishings of the Tabernacle. It is an important preparation for their new campaign into the wilderness. 

The Israelites had no idea what would happen as they ventured into a new land filled with countless unknowns. I would argue that our paths are very similar. None of us knows what will happen during the next few years. We don’t know who we will become friends with, what clubs we might join, and for many of us what major we will study. There is an entire world of unknowns as we end high school. So I think we should also take a moment to enumerate what we ourselves have learned and achieved. Take your own census itemizing where you are right now and what you have done to accomplish this great achievement that is graduating from Barrack Hebrew Academy. Calculate as well what you might have done better and how you hope to improve in the future.

Each and every one one of us has learned so much during our time at Barrack. We have developed friendships, written dozens of papers, and learned new languages. Our teachers devoted their time and effort to preparing us for the unfamiliar journeys we will take as we head off to our next endeavors. My goal is not to tell you that you will be 100% prepared for the future. None of us can ever be since the future is unknown. However, my hope is that we can all take along with us the lessons we have learned during our time here at Barrack and truly strive for the success that each one of us is capable of achieving. 

I would like to leave you with one more piece of Torah before you embark on this journey. In a famous midrash, the Rabbis teach that the number of people counted in the census, 603,550, is equivalent to the number of letters in the Torah. Each person individually represents one letter. If people are considered separately, there would be no Torah, but together as a community we can thrive and find success in our teachings and traditions. Each one of us adds our own spark and light to the Barrack community and the Jewish community as a whole. Each one of us will find our place in the larger Jewish community and in the world, wherever we may end up.

My hope for the coming years, as we prepare to go through our own unknowns, is that we do not forget the preparations and blessings that were given to us by our family, friends, teachers, and our communities. Congratulations to everyone who is graduating today, and I hope you all find your own successes. 

Edan Held '24

Good evening, everyone, and welcome to Barrack’s 2024 graduation ceremony! As I stand in front of you all, I’m thinking back to my first Hebrew classes when Hedva taught me how to write in cursive, as Brynn, or should I say Ziba Liba, and I struggled to understand what was happening. Little did I know that seven years later, I would be standing in front of you all, delivering a graduation speech in Hebrew. That being said, I want to warn the Israelis in the room to please have some sympathy when I mispronounce or mistranslate a word. And when I do, a fair share of Hebrew teachers are sitting in the audience to glance at! Just kidding, but I’ll try my best to make all of you proud!

I want to take a trip down memory lane for a minute. Transitioning to Barrack from public school in sixth grade, I walked into school surrounded by unfamiliar faces — both teachers and classmates — and a weird-looking schedule featuring days labeled “A through “G.” It took a few weeks to adjust to both this new schedule and the new faces, but from the moment I stepped onto campus, I was welcomed with open arms. Fast forward just a few short months, and I was spending four days in the middle of nowhere Connecticut out in the woods, with these new classmates.

You know, when I was trying to draw some inspiration for what to say during this speech, I tried to look back on our 8th grade moving-up day ceremony, but for some reason, I was drawing a blank. I thought about this for a while, but then it clicked! We didn’t have one. Reflecting on that time now, I vividly remember crawling into my parents’ bed to watch the “Mr. Dorsch Production” honoring the Class of 2024.

To put it plainly, this wasn’t the most ideal end to 8th grade. We missed out on the all-exciting 8th grade Israel trip, and after the inherent “two weeks of virtual school,” we continued rolling out of bed in the morning, pretending we were awake, and logging onto online classes as we struggled to keep our eyes open.

I think I speak for a lot of people in the room when I say that it was so difficult not interacting with people or not leaving our houses on a daily basis. Now, I don’t want to dwell on COVID times too much, but I can say that during such an isolating time, the Kehillah of Barrack, and more specifically, the Class of 2024, shined through. During these isolating times when many of us felt alone and became easily annoyed by our families — admit it, we all felt that at some point — our dedicated Middle School Council organized several movie nights, helping to connect us all. Despite some technical difficulties as we adjusted to everything being virtual, small things like these made the feelings of isolation manageable and brought me closer to my classmates.

Similarly, weekly baking Zoom calls allowed us to connect with each other while simultaneously providing our families with delicious treats. Look, my parents might not have trusted me to be baking after two fire trucks came to the house when I tried to make pancakes, but I am happy to say that not only were the recipes a success, but the small virtual interactions brought a sense of community to me as well.

I want to share one more example demonstrating how the cohesiveness of the Class of 2024 will stick with me forever. During Muss, even after long days of hiking and being out in the sun, many of us would come together, sit in a circle on the grass, and play a little game called “Lap-Tag.” Let me explain a little. To begin, we would create two circles, one inside the other, with those in the inside circle sitting directly in front of the people in the outside circle. Someone in the middle would call at least two people’s names who were seated in the inside circle, and those people would race to high-five the middle person while the person sitting behind them attempted to hold them back. For those hearing the basics of this game for the first time, it may sound a bit chaotic and strange, but I promise, we played this while laughing and joking around. I’ll admit it occasionally did get a little violent, and some light injuries may have occurred. Still, no matter how out of hand it got, we all came out of the game with a smile on our faces, a new memory to collectively share, and a bond that will last forever.

Now, as we graduate high school and many of us prepare to step foot onto college campuses across the country at a time when anti-semitism is on the rise and too many Jewish students feel unsafe, I know the Class of 2024 will continue to be there to support each and everyone standing alongside me. Whether some of us face similar situations to which we can relate and work through, or if we simply need a reminder to be proud of who we are, I am confident that my peers and I will continue to be active members of the many communities we are part of. We have stood together in times of adversity before, and I know that we will continue to do so as every one of us goes on our own path!

Before I hand the microphone over, I want to thank some of the people who supported the class of 2024 throughout our high school journey. To all faculty and staff, thank you for your dedication to our education, your patience during our panics, and your willingness to help every one of us, often no matter the time of day. To all the parents and families in the audience: thank you for sending your children to Barrack and giving me a second family! Thank you for supporting us even when we were panicked at midnight, rushing to submit an English essay before the deadline. And most importantly, to the Class of 2024: thank you for being my second family and getting me and everyone sitting alongside you through the last four and some seven years! Mazal Tov to everyone, and thank you!

Andy Jacoby '24

A few weeks ago, I finally decided to do a deep cleaning of my room. As I was going through the box of papers in the depths of my desk, I found an envelope with my name in beautiful calligraphy on the front. Inside, there was a letter that I received at the end of sixth grade from my Core teacher, Ms. Pransky. It began, 

“Dear Andy,

After getting to know you during 6th grade at Barrack, I think of you as a highly intelligent student who wants very much to learn and a caring person who thinks deeply about the world around him.“

She went on to further reflect on our time in 6th grade. At the end of the letter, Ms. Pransky included a list of words describing what each of our classmates thought about us. I’ll be honest, I had completely forgotten about the letter, but it got me thinking. Not only did she get to know me well enough to mention the attributes that I aspire to every day but she did that for every person in the class. Yet she didn’t just share her appreciation of us as individuals; she coordinated student-to-student commentary where everyone in the Core class wrote what they admired about each other. Finding the letter from Mrs. Pransky brought back memories of not only what 6th grade was like but who I was in 6th grade. 

Every year, Barrack’s 6th-grade class hosts an event called Artifact Alley, where each person brings in an artifact and sets it up for the whole school to see. While every object has innate utilitarian or aesthetic value, often our artifacts were objects that our grandparents or great-grandparents chose to keep for sentimental reasons --the feelings they evoked, the stories they represented. I displayed my Bubba’s candlesticks because they were one of the few things she brought with her from Poland when immigrating to America. When we choose to keep an object, we actively decide what we want to remember about that stage of life. Objects allow us to freeze a portion of ourselves in a moment. Later we can revisit those moments and our past selves. So, I’m going to take you through an Artifact Alley of the Class of 2024’s Barrack experience. 

Our 7th Grade experience was defined by B’nei Mitzvot. Almost every weekend the entire community came together to celebrate our passage into Jewish adulthood. From the beautiful tree on Liana’s invitation to Jacob’s chic plexiglass one, each invitation and ceremony was unique and personal. They represented how each person chose to share their celebration and represent themselves to the larger community. At the same time, each of us was learning how to interact with the world around us and be our own people while navigating the complex social dynamics of 7th grade. 

We continued that growth unobstructed for most of 8th grade. We had a relatively normal experience, preparing for our trip to Israel, enjoying our reading groups, and being regular eighth graders. Yet on March 13 that all changed. Mrs. Farrell called us into an assembly and announced that the world was going into quarantine because of a new virus called Covid-19. We all thought it would only be a few days off. As the pandemic progressed, it became apparent that we were not going return to in-person school any time soon. So, we were stuck in our houses, without toilet paper, for weeks on end. 

Covid allowed the Barrack community to demonstrate its resilience. We took geometry tests on Google Forms, attended Core on Google Meet, and built a paper rollercoaster. Yet, Barrack truly demonstrated its tenacity in the form of the hundreds of Facetime calls with friends, honest conversations with teachers about the reality of life in quarantine, and our 8th-grade moving-up day. At the end of the year, the whole grade gathered in masks in Barrack’s front circle with our teachers. Each of us got to celebrate the completion of middle school, socially distanced but together. We collected our diplomas, thanked our teachers, and said hi to each other in person for the first time in months. Most importantly we collected these shirts. For those that can’t read it, the shirt says: Class of 2024, the one where we were quarantined. 

We began our high school experience with a virtual pep rally at 9:45 am on Monday 7th of September 2020. At the same time that we were supposed to be learning how to be high schoolers, we were still in a pandemic. Yet it provided us with an opportunity to demonstrate perseverance. We biked to each other’s houses to chat. We watched Teen Beach Movie together before Hebrew classes and got chased by geese in our tents. We ate on the multicolored dots in Barrack’s backyard. During the winter we used flame thrower-style heaters to stay warm and in the spring there was so much hay in the tent that some of us got hay fever. The whole time, we relied on each other and went through it together. 

After being unable to have events for nearly two years, we had a red carpet movie night in 10th grade. All of us showed up in cocktail attire, took pictures, ate some food, played some games, and watched a movie. At the end of the night, each of us received these goody bags with a mini Oscar award to celebrate the night. Our transition to a normal high school experience continued throughout the year. We brought back the muffin sale, took some verbal chem tests with Mr. Maiman, and visited Drexel’s engineering labs. At the end of the year we even got to have our 9th and 10th grade dance together. 

We finally got that Israel trip in 11th Grade. For a lot of us, Muss was a life-changing experience. As we were learning about Israel and exploring the country, we were also learning about how to function away from home, in another part of the world. We figured out how to escape the week-old pizza and powdered egg shakshuka of the dining hall and provided ourselves with delicious food together through panini parties. We learned how to live with each other (like roommate card). At the same time, we went through life-changing experiences. From going to 9 am Israel Studies classes to singing “Bombs Away Li” in the Kineret after finishing Yam le Yam, we truly grew together as a class. When we came back from Muss, there was a section of the cafeteria where everyone in the grade ate in one big circle. In one form or another, that unity remained prevalent throughout the rest of our Barrack experience. 

As seniors, we have gone through a stressful but successful college process, finished high school, and are moving on (motion to diplomas). Throughout our time at Barrack, we have collected all of these objects and memories. (face classmates) Each of them is who you were at different stages of your life. They track your growth as a person and our growth as a class. Even if our core values and attributes aren’t so different from the ones Ms. Pransky described in her letter, we have learned how to incorporate them into our day-to-day lives. 

As we step into the future, let's carry these memories and lessons with us. I challenge you all to reflect on your paths—dive into your own keepsakes and listen to the stories they tell. These artifacts aren't just objects; they are emblematic of our growth. They trace the grit that defines our class, the lifelong connections we've formed, and how our community shaped us into the remarkable individuals we are today. 

This is one of those moments we will save for the rest of our lives. (address class) Whether you choose your beautiful yearbook, your grad cap, your diploma, or some other artifact, this moment will be with you forever. Look at the warmth on your teachers' faces. Look at the pride on your family’s faces. Look at your classmates all around you. These are the people you grew up with. Take it all in. Experience everyone being together, one last time. Pause for a second. Can you feel the love radiating from the room?