As a Favor to Dixie Yid, Please Read!

Howdy y'all! I want to ask you to read something about my son's cheder, Siach Yitzchak, which is an amazing place, with the hopes that you will buy a raffle ticket (and write my name in the "Referred By" box) to support the school. The drawing will be this Sunday, Feb. 15th, though that date will probably be extended a bit. Tickets are $100 for one ticket and $360 for five. The prize is a choice between (i) $20,000 cash or (ii) $25,000 toward a Sefer Torah, a trip to Israel for 10, or a new car.

 

As I wrote the last two years, Siach Yitzchak is unlike almost any other yeshiva that I have heard of. Please see those links to prior posts where I detailed a few examples of things that show how Reb Dovid Sitnick (who was appointed to head the cheder by its founder, Rav Shlomo Freifeld) has created a cheder in which the boys experience how Yiddishkeit and Torah are the most precious things in the world. My son is now in fourth grade and has been in the cheder since he was three years old. In addition to the observations I related in my previous posts about the cheder, here are a few more examples of things which I feel make Siach Yitzchak stand out as such an unusual and special place:

• My daughter told me that, as my wife was dropping our son off at school after one of the major snowstorms in the past couple of weeks, she observed Rabbi Seide, the educational director of the cheder, lifting as many boys as he could over the huge pile of snow on the side of the road as they came to school.
• The rebbeim truly care about the boys and it comes across in everything. My son's rebbe from Pre-1-A (4 years ago) sat down with him the other day to ask him about his recent extra-curricular Mishnayos learning (with me) and discussed with him ideas on what to learn next!
• At PTA conferences last month, our son's rebbe advised us, when reviewing each day's kriah homework with our son, that we should go back to make sure he understands the words he had a problem with. But he added that the homework should not take more than about 20 minutes. He told us we should stop in the middle if it does because beyond that, it will just drive him crazy and it will become counterproductive.
• The previous example, along with the energy and excitement the rebbeim put in, show that their entire focus is on giving the kids not just technical learning skills, but, even more importantly, a love for learning and a feeling of satisfaction from it.

With all of the lack of excitement about Yiddishkeit and the focus on externals that we see are so prevalent in some yeshivos, I feel so blessed that we have merited to find and be able to send our son to a cheder like this.

 

As a favor, I therefore ask you to please go right away to buy a raffle ticket before the end of the day this Sunday, February 15th! Thank you!

 

In the website form, please write "Dixie Yid" or my real name (if you know it) in the "Referred By" box. If you feel more comfortable, you can also call the cheder's office number (718-327-6247) to give them your credit card info or you can give it to me at 516-668-6397 and I can take care of it for you. Note that the system allows you to pay for the ticket(s) all at once or split it up over 4 payments. Shkoyach!!

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As a Favor to "the Dixie Yid," Please Read This about Talmud Torah Siach Yitzchok

Y'all know I don't ask much. But as in past years, I ask again as a favor if you can please buy a raffle ticket to support my son's cheder, Siach Yitzchok (and write my name in the referral box). The drawing is this Sunday, Jan. 5th. Tickets are $100 for one ticket and $360 for five. The prize is a choice between (i) $20,000 cash or (ii) $25,000 toward a Sefer Torah, a trip to Israel for 10, or a new car.

 

I wrote a little about it last year, when my son was in 2nd grade, and Reb Dovid Sitnick (who was picked by Rav Shlomo Freifeld to head the school) and the whole hanhala have continued to make the cheder so awesome in so many ways. It so rare to find rebbeim who love Torah and everything about Yiddishkeit so much that the boys absorb that excitement and geshmak in their own learning and davening. The rebbeim's whole life's ambition is to be machanchim. It is such a pleasure to visit the school and speak with them. Please don't think that I'm exaggerating in any way about this either. Baruch Hashem, my son has had rebbeim since he was 4 (in kindergarten) and every one has been so fantastic.

 

A few random representative observations:

• When I drop off my son and some classes are already davening, you can hear the classes davening so loudly, putting their energy into it, through the windows.
• When my son's kindergarten rebbe, Rabbi Kviat (son of the famous R. Dovid Kviat, author of Sukkas Dovid), would line the boys up for dismissal, they would enthusiastically sing Tehillim together.
• When we visited Siach Yitzchok in the process of choosing a yeshiva for our son, the thing that most impressed us was that in every class, we noticed a pattern that virtually all of the boys were really engaged with the rebbeim. Usually many or most kids are drifting off in one way or another, but the engagement between the boys and their rebbe in this cheder was very noticeable.
• It has happened countless times with all of my son's rebbeim that when he or another boy finishes a masechta or parsha, or does some great mitzvah, that the rebbe makes a really big deal about it with the whole class which (i) reinforces the desire to do great things in the boy being "honored" and (ii) gives chizuk to other boys to do the same.
• The cheder has a no-tolerance policy toward bullying, B"H, so that's a very rare occurrence and when it does happen, it's dealt with swiftly and decisively, which is unfortunately not always the case with some other schools. (P.S. there's of course no corporal punishment in the cheder.)
• I could go on and on with various things, but the common denominator is that it's a place where the boys find the "soul" within their Yiddishkeit.

With all of the lack of excitement about Yiddishkeit and the focus on externals that we see are so prevalent in some yeshivos, I feel so blessed that we have merited to find and be able to send our son to a cheder like this.

 

I therefore ask you to please go right away to buy a raffle ticket before the end of the day this Sunday, Jan. 5th! Thank you!

 

In the website form, please write "Dixie Yid" or my real name in the "Referred By" box. If you feel more comfortable, you can also call the cheder's office number (718-327-6247) to give them your credit card info or you can give it to me at 516-668-6397 to do it by phone. Note that the system allows you to buy the ticket all at once or split it up over 4 payments. Shkoyach!!

 

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