Collaborative Partnerships

Social Curriculum and Chavurah

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In our lower grades students  learn and share experiences both within their chavurah/homeroom and their larger learning community (their kehillah). These diverse experiences provide our younger students with an opportunity to learn in collaborative environments and our older students, to practice their leadership skills.

This experience continues and deepens with our middle school students. In these grades we use habits of mind and Jewish values to engage our students in multiple experiences that emphasize collaboration, team building, respect and acceptance. These experiences happen in their own learning community, through work with our younger students and via civic engagement projects outside of school.

Boston-Haifa STEM project

eighth graders in Israel
The Boston-Haifa Science Fair is a collaborative multidisciplinary STEM research project with 7th and 8th grade students, teachers and scientists from Haifa and Boston. 

Through this project, students:
  • learn scientific inquiry skills so they can independently design and execute a scientific and/or an engineering study including writing and oral communication
  • are introduced to STEM as a multidisciplinary concept. 
  • are familiarized with “real life” STEM through their work with scientists, engineers and physicians 
  • learn collaboratively (face to face and e-learning) outside the borders of the traditional classroom.
  • use STEM as a means to create bridges and lasting relationships with students in Haifa

This collaborative project has received support from academic institutes and individuals within these institutes including MIT, Tel Aviv University, Technion, Ben-Gurion University and Harvard Medical School. These supporters interact with the students throughout the year, provide students and their mentors with resources for their research projects and attend the science fair itself. A highlight of this project is our 8th grade trip to Israel where we visit the Technion and other scientific labs with our Israeli counterparts.  Later in the year, these Israeli students come to Boston and visit academic labs at MIT and Harvard.

The project was awarded the AAAS-Subaru and the Yemimah Harpaz award.