Stephanie Samuels Middle School  Limudei Kodesh  Teacher In addition to teaching Chumash and Navi, Stephanie Samuels serves as Sixth Grade Dean and is Director of the Maimonides Fellows program. She is the proud mother of a Maimo student and three alumni. Parshat Bamidbar  opens with a census, focusing specifically on men aged twenty and above—those eligible to fight the enemies of  Bnei Yisrael —as the nation prepares for their journey through the wilderness toward the land of Israel:  (מִבֶּ֨ן עֶשְׂרִ֤ים שָׁנָה֙ וָמַ֔עְלָה כׇּל־יֹצֵ֥א צָבָ֖א בְּיִשְׂרָאֵ֑ל (במדבר א:ג Every individual counts in this census; no one is left out. Rashi comments on the phrase שְׂאוּ אֶת־רֹאשׁ כׇּל־עֲדַת בְּנֵי־יִשְׂרָאֵל,  Take a census [literally “lift the head”] of the whole congregation of Israel,  explaining that “due to  Hashem ’s love for them,  Hashem  counts them frequently.” Every person matters and has something unique to contribute to the wh...

Rabbi Mark Gottlieb Former Maimonides Principal Rabbi Mark Gottlieb served as Middle/Upper School Principal at Maimonides from 2000-2005, then as Head of School at Yeshiva University High School. He is currently Chief Education Officer at the Tikvah Fund and a member of the Advisory Board to the President’s Commission on Religious Liberty. As the school year winds down, a season of student milestones rapidly replaces the more ordinary days of classes and learning. We celebrate all sorts of academic achievements, coming-of-age events, and more. The atmosphere feels different, more vibrant, even electric at times. Then the school year quickly ends, summer starts, and before we can catch our breath, the whole cycle repeats itself with the beginning of the new year in September. This pattern is not a mere accident of annual school schedules, but may suggest something much deeper and elemental.   The balance of ordinary and blissful, dynamic and rock-steady, is embedded into the very fa...

Jacob Pinnolis Chiel Educator-in-Residence Jacob Pinnolis joined Maimonides in 2020 as Chiel Educator-in-Residence, named by Lisa Rosenbaum and Ron Fisher in honor of Judy and Jonathan Chiel. This position allows Jacob to serve in a high-level consultative leadership role that leverages his considerable expertise in systematic implementation of reflective teaching practice, with a focus on student-centered learning and mastery. He also served as Interim CEO during the 2021-22 academic year while we conducted a nationwide search for a new Head of School. What is the place of perfection and imperfection in our lives? When do things need to be just so, and when is close not good enough? When is imperfection or incompleteness actually the preferred state?   Among the regulations for the  kohanim  in  Emor  are a number which describe elements that must be perfect. For whose funeral they can become  tameh , how they should keep their hair, and even whether they ...

Bracha Krohn ('94) Bracha (Shapiro) Krohn ('94) currently serves as Menahelet at Midreshet Moriah in Jerusalem, and spends summers on staff at Camp Stone in Pennsylvania. She is married to classmate Adin Krohn ('94) and has three alumni siblings. Bracha is the daughter of Miriam and Rabbi David Shapiro, former Maimonides School principal. This week we will read two  parshiot ,  Acharei-Mot  and  Kedoshim. Acharei Mot  begins in the aftermath of Nadav and Avihu's tragic deaths, after their attempt to enter the Holy of Holies in an inappropriate, forbidden way. After that fiasco, although their intentions were presumably noble,  Hashem  tells Moshe to teach Aharon that בזאת יבוא אהרון אל הקודש, in  this  way  Aharon  may enter the Holy of Holies. Not his sons, and not just any day of the week.  Hashem  proceeds to instruct the Jewish people about  Yom Kippur  and the special  avodah  on that one special d...

Dr. David Fischer Upper School Science Teacher In addition to teaching Geometry, Chemistry, and Environmental Science, Dr. Fischer has led a Bekiut Talmud elective and a Daf Yomi group. He is the proud father of two Maimo students and three alumni. The  mishna  in  Pirkei Avot  relates that Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai asked his students to tell him what defines a good path for a person to chart for himself. Rabbi Yose answered “a good neighbor.” And in our morning prayers prior to  Psukei Dzimra , we beseech G-d to deliver us from a “bad neighbor.”   Throughout our moves into different neighborhoods, our family has been consistently blessed with good neighbors. They have been of different religions, races, ages, and political leanings, but have almost invariably been kind, empathetic, and helpful, and I hope that we in turn have been the same for them. So when I found out that our current neighbors were participating in the March of the Living with their temp...