Getting connected

Shabbat.com brings people together – and not just for Shabbat By Ilan Preskovsky As a community and campus rabbi, Rabbi Benzion Klatzko has long hosted Jews of all ages, stripes, and religious affiliations at his Shabbos table. He has done so in such number, in fact, that neighbours would ask if they could take on some of those guests, but, with hachnasas orchim (hospitality) being so near and dear to Rabbi Klatzko’s heart, he asked why they couldn’t find guests of their own. Quite reasonably for people not as highly…

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Everything’s better with chocolate!

  By: Avigail Goldberg I’ve grown up with a passion for cooking, baking, and food innovation. I can’t say I have one particular food interest, as I love the creativity involved across all the food spectrums. Over the years I have established my own catering company from my Pretoria home called Abby’s Kitchen. I make a variety of home-made meals, do catering for events, and I run a cupcake business on the side. I am constantly trying to keep up with the ever-evolving food trends and I enjoy the challenge…

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A helping hand

Up close with some new organisations giving support to parents and families   By Chandrea Serebro The stress and pressure of finding ways to deal positively with a child’s remedial issues and the many lifestyle-affecting factors that go along with them is one thing, but few people truly consider the enormity of the effect this situation has on parents and the rest of the family. The recognition and awareness of the issues, the decisions that have to be made, living with choices that are made, the happiness of the child,…

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Should I stay or should I go?

Parents and experts sound off on the difficult decision of whether to hold a child back a grade   By Chandrea Serebro When it comes to children, no decision is easy. And the changing world seems to be making the terrain even rougher for parents and even kids themselves to navigate. Before, the system dictated that the cut-off age for starting school used to be six years old, and the intake ran from July to June. Now it runs from January to December, with many parents of children born toward…

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Thinking out loud

Students share their opinions on a variety of questions   By Chandrea Serebro How do you want to grow or change to ready yourself for next year? Nearly every matric student has to answer this question, in one form or another, during his final year of school. We are asked this question because people who came before us have informed us about how the transition from ‘school’ into the ‘real world’ is not for the faint-hearted. As matric students, we are taught that we have to prepare for the reality…

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The Jerusalem Science Contest

An opportunity for Jewish high school students around the world to pit their wits against each other and stand the chance to win some amazing prizes   By Ilan Preskovsky As if created just to prove how compatible science and Judaism truly are, the Walder Science Center is largely aimed at giving kids, teenagers, and college students in the Chicago area an extracurricular resource to more fully explore and engage with science through “a prism of Jewish values”. The centre was established in 2000 by Dr Joseph Walder as the…

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Go DEEP!

  A revolution in education is taking place in Chicago   By Ilan Preskovsky The South African Jewish community has plenty of which we can be proud, but perhaps nothing more than the quality of our schools. For years, both our more traditional Jewish schools, as well as more explicitly religious schools have prided themselves on exceptional levels of secular education to go along with their Jewish character and value systems. It’s not for nothing, after all, that our matriculants consistently rank among the highest scorers in the country, with…

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