Volume 30 Issue 7

lion’s talethe

charles e. smith jewish day school • 11710 hunters lane, rockville, maryland thursday, may 2, 2013 • vol. 30 issue 7

There are 8 hours until morning.

How will you spend them?

Procrastination: Page 12

02 • the lion’s tale • opinion

lion’s talethe

print editorseditors-in-chief •

ari charnoff, dore feithmanaging •

stu krantz copy •

aaron boxerman, dina rabinovitz design •

jeremy etelson, jonathan reemnews •

malka himelhoch, nina simpkinschadashot •

matthew foldi, shira ungar features •

alison kraner, yael krifcherentertainment •

eitan snyder, hannah wexlerin-depth •

maddie dworkin, haley lerner sports •

brian schonfeld, jesse zwebengraphic •r’ay fodor

photo •david kulp

social media •yosi vogelbusiness •

alec schrager, allie wiener

senior reporters kobi fodor • matt halpern

gefen kabik • danny waksman

reportersmijal altmann • robbie belson

michael berkowitz • cole cooper

isaac dubrawsky • emma hofman

sj hyman • yonah hyman

hannah nechin • gaby pilarski

steven reichel • uri schwartz

jonah shrock • carol silber

photographerssamantha berman • daniel brandsdorfer

noa dahan • hadas elazar-mittelman

hannah josovitz • talya kravitz

joshua lempert • jonathan silverman

staff adviserclaire burke

adviser emeritasusan zuckerman

The Lion’s Tale Editorial and Ethics Policy

As the student newspaper of the Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School, The Lion’s Tale is a forum for student opinion and expression. All content is

determined by students. Its purpose is to inform the CESJDS community and to express the views of its staff and readers. The staff has made every effort to

ensure the accuracy and objectivity of its news.

Signed columns reflect the opinion of the writer; staff editorials reflect the opinion of the majority of The Lion’s Tale editorial board. The Lion’s Tale staff

welcomes letters to the editor and guest columns, all of which must be signed. The staff reserves the right to refuse any material and may edit letters or

columns for length, clarity, libel, obscenity and/or disruptiveness.

Submissions may be emailed to [email protected], mailed to The Lion’s Tale, or brought to room 328.

The Lion’s Tale is funded by The Simon Hirshman Endowment for the Upper School Newspaper and The Kuttner-Levenson Endowment for the Upper

School Cultural Arts and Student Publications, and community advertisement. The Lion’s Tale reserves the right to refuse advertisement for any reason.

The staff will adhere to the ethics policies of The Society of Professional Jour-nalists and the National Scholastic Press Association. The adviser will be held

to the Journalism Education Association’s Adviser Code of Ethics.

web editorseditors-in-chief •

alexander flum, jeremy kaplancopy •

cole aronson, jonathan orbachsection editors •

evan kravitz, matt litman & adina pollak

Almost exactly two years ago, the administration announced that the three-tiered class system — the three levels of which were, in ascending order of difficulty, College Prep, Honors and Scholars — that existed for nearly every subject would be largely replaced.

Now, high school students (ex-cept for the Class of 2014) are sort-ed into “Advanced” or “Enriched College Prep” (ECP) for English, history and life science courses. Chemistry experienced no changes, and a less math-intensive level was added in physics. Math and foreign language levels remained as they had been.

We believe that the switch in the humanities and life sciences was a poor decision.

The two-tiered system con-denses students into fewer levels, greatly expanding the skill range within a classroom. The current sophomore class is completing its second year in this system and many students to whom we’ve spoken both on and off The Lion’s Tale editorial staff have commented that the large skill-ranges within a classroom have caused a number of problems. Many feel either bored or too challenged by the level of instruction and class discussion.

This seems to make sense: with a wider range of skills and expectations, class discussion and instruction will, almost necessarily, be farther from a given student’s desired level. More tiers means a system better geared to individual students’ needs.

In creating the Advanced level, the administration aimed to fuse Honors and Scholars, essentially

meeting halfway. It created the ECP class in much the same way, as it was meant to be slightly harder than the CP class but not as difficult as Honors. These choices hurt all students.

Students who would have been in a Scholars class find their classes too easy. Alternatively, students who would have been comfortable in CP now have to contend with a more difficult class and a popula-tion of students who would have been in Honors but are now in ECP. Honors-qualified students are hurt most, as many do not fit in either ECP or Advanced.

This greater variety in skill levels in the classroom does not only affect students and make them feel out of place more often, but it also makes the job of the teacher much more difficult. As in every setting, it is up to the teacher to decide how to pace the class. In conversations with teachers, they have said that they struggle with wheth-er they should move quickly and risk leaving behind the students who would have been better geared to Honors, or whether they should make the class move more slowly, and risk leaving the students who wanted a Scholars-paced class unhappy and unchallenged.

Neither solution is ideal and the end result is that the teacher must work at differ-ent speeds and on different levels with different students in order to satisfy everyone’s expectations. This places a greater burden on teachers, as they cannot just use a pace

that makes everybody happy, but must constantly switch — stopping to explain while also trying to move quickly.

The two-level system caus-es more discomfort for students, lowering their quality of learning. Independent of grades, GPAs and transcripts, having fewer levels meets the needs of fewer students and makes it harder for them to learn than it was in the old system. The administration may have made the switch to help students in the middle who, under the old system,

would not have been in the top lev-el, but are there now because of the two-tiered system’s lowered ceiling. Instead, JDS should offer the best learning experience for the most students and return to the three-tiered system.

lion’s talethe .org

For more tales from the lion’s den, visit:

04NEWS AP testing

08IN-DEPTH Health and stress SPORTS 16 Mr. Forestieri: more than a coach

ENTERTAINMENT 14 Value of an arts education

FEATURES 11 Married Alumni

07CHADASHOT Forgotten Yom

New class levels hinder learningStaff editorial

boston bombing • the lion’s tale • 03

BOSTON

Op-Ed: Spending a weekend in post-attack BostonI had known for months that I would be

making my first trip to Boston on April 19, and although the main purpose of the trip was my cousin’s bat mitzvah ceremony, I was still excited to see the historic city and go sightseeing.

The bombings at the Boston Marathon brought all of these plans to a screeching halt. We initially planned to go up on the first flight Friday morning and meet my older brother in Boston for a day of sightseeing

before the bat mitzvah. The Boston Marathon bombings on April 15 altered those plans and threatened to cancel the whole weekend, especially after Thursday (4/18) night’s shootout that killed Tamerlan, the older of the two Tsarnaev brothers, and left Dzhokhar, the younger, on the run.

My parents and I woke up at 4:30 a.m. on Friday for the 6:35 a.m. flight as planned, but instead of being in the middle of

downtown Boston at 9:00 a.m., ready to see everything it had to offer, we were eating breakfast at our Boston hotel and watching the latest updates on the manhunt for the runaway bomber, along with many other visitors whose days had also been clearly wrecked.

We sat in the hotel room watching the latest coverage for eight hours, looking outside at an almost completely deserted major American city. We were able to leave the hotel for about 20 minutes to go across the street to a Panera, one of the few stores not closed down by the FBI. It isn’t often that a Panera in a busy part of large town has only seven customers at 1:30 p.m.

At about 5:30 p.m., my parents and I drove 10 minutes to my cousins’ house in Newton, Mass., for the Shabbat dinner. Unsurprisingly, about 25 of the scheduled 40 people were not able to make it.

Soon after we got there, I was playing basketball with my cousins in their driveway and we saw seven or eight police cars speeding down the road. Unbeknownst to us, they were on the

way to finally take hideaway Dzhokhar Tsarnaev into custody. On Saturday, the bat mitzvah ceremony went as planned,

but there was almost a big problem — the caterer for the Kid-dush couldn’t travel on Friday. Fortunately, the food arrived at the synagogue but within mere hours of when it would be eaten.

After about an hour of walking through downtown Boston after the Kiddush, we stumbled upon the site of the bombings, which was still closed off for the police investigation. The fence blocking off the street had been turned into a memorial for the victims of the bombings. Being in the same place those bombs went off less than a week earlier, and seeing cheerful ads on streetlamps about the marathon that had probably been there for months, was a chilling experience. By contrast, the rest of the weekend was pretty normal.

After the fear that Boston felt on Friday, and the solemnity of the yet-unfinished memorial, I don’t think I will ever forget my first trip to Massachusetts’s capital.

by jeremy schoolerguest columnist

“It began with two explosions. We heard two booms and we didn’t know quite what it was. We couldn’t quite let ourselves believe it.”

On Monday, April 15, two bombs were detonated at the finish line of the annual Boston Marathon, leaving three dead and al-most 300 wounded. The marathon, one of the world’s most respected, is a national attraction, bringing tens of thousands of people to watch and to run in the 26.2-mile event.

For Alex Tritell (‘12), seeing the Boston Marathon in person was a lifelong dream. This year, he finally took the opportunity to travel to Boston with a few friends to watch the race.

“It’s the oldest marathon in America,” Tritell said. “I wanted to be able to watch the race and be a part of the atmosphere. ... I’ve watched it on TV for multiple years.”

Jewish History teacher Aaron Bregman, a native Bostonian, believes that the Boston Marathon is one of the city’s most important days of the year.

“The Boston Marathon is a day of jubilee — every school has the day off ... you go out to drink, to eat, to celebrate,” Bregman said. “Many people have family and friends running

the marathon. It’s central to the city.”Josh Dalva (‘12), a sophomore at Boston

University, lives in an apartment along the marathon race course, about a mile from the finish line. A veteran of several Marathon Mondays, Dalva sees the event as an inherently Bostonian one.

“People celebrate a unique Boston cul-ture,” Dalva said. “The entire city just shuts down and turns their entire focus to the mar-athon, and whether or not it’s actually about the running itself, it’s about cheering people on ... it’s a celebration of Boston heritage, and culture, and tradition.”

When the bombs went off, Tritell and his friends were 50 feet from the finish line.

“It began with two explosions,” Tritell said. “We heard two booms and we didn’t know quite what it was. We couldn’t quite let ourselves believe it. On some level, however, we know that it wasn’t random.”

Dalva was celebrating a Red Sox victory with his friends when, suddenly, alerts of what had happened at the marathon started to flood in.

“I started getting a lot of calls, a lot of texts,” Dalva said.

For Tritell, a freshman at Bates College,

the aftermath of the attack was one of intense confusion.

“We didn’t know where to go, or how to get anywhere,” Tritell said. “We were just trapped there — we didn’t have a car, we couldn’t take the train. We just stood outside in the cold for a while, we saw people crying, people freaking out, all cell phone service had gone down.”

Slowly, the dust started to settle. When reports of the tragedy came in, Bregman was overwhelmed.

“Sadness, just total — it’s hard to even describe,” Bregman said. “I can only imagine what it was like for my friends who were in Boston that day ... kind of a breakdown of ‘I can’t believe this happened.’”

Dalva had a similar reaction. Initially, he could not believe the scope of what had happened.

“I was pretty shocked,” Dalva said. “You never think that something like that is going to hit close to home. I was in shock and disbelief.”

After watching the news, Tritell made a surprising discovery — through a twist of fate, he had been standing at the very spot where the second bomb went off just a few minutes earlier.

“We realized that where we were standing for the first part of it was extraordinarily close to where the bomb went off and where the second bomb went off, we were standing there just fifteen minutes earlier,” Tritell said.

The event, however, did not end with the bombings. Following gunfire exchanges between the bombing suspects and police on Thursday night, Boston was placed in a state of emergency. While Tritell left the morning after the attack, Dalva was in Boston when the city was shut down.

“No one left, no one was going anywhere,” Dalva said. “They were just chasing this guy, all Thursday night, all Friday.”

In the end, both Tritell and Bregman believe, that fateful day in April will have a long-term impact.

“I think it’s certainly going to take time. There are a lot of questions still to ask,” Breg-man said.

“It’s a day that’s supposed to have so much joy,” Tritell said. “... All these people finished the Boston Marathon, it’s Patriot’s Day, the Red Sox won, but instead you have all this gloom. ... It’s going to taint this day for a long time.”

by aaron boxermancopy editor

Alumni and faculty recount bombings’ horror

04 • the lion’s tale • news

The stress about Advanced Placement tests has reached its peak. On Monday, the first of more than 30 AP tests will take place in Maryland. Most students taking these exams spend all year preparing, but not at CESJDS. Instead, some JDS students choose to spend their afternoons and weekends pouring over their AP study books.

AP exams were created to allow students to bypass elementary cours-es in college. In this day and age, they can also be used to impress colleges.

According to Director of College Guidance Susan Rexford, AP exams are not a necessity for JDS students.

“They’re going to look at them in the context of the school they came from so coming from a non-AP ... school,” Rexford said. “There is no expectation that students are going to bring in those credits.”

Rexford believes that it is benefi-cial for students to take the exams.

“[Students] can show mastery of a subject matter based on the results of some form of a standardized test like the AP exam,” Rexford said.

AP exams can also have benefits beyond college admissions.

“Sometimes you get enough credit that you move up a little bit in terms of being able to register for college courses earlier,” Rexford said.

“Or you might get a better residence hall selection and those types of things.”

These bonuses are not the decid-ing factor for junior Julianna Nechin, who said that the reason she is taking AP exams is because she thinks she’ll be able to pass.

“I am just taking them ... be-cause I know the material,” Nechin said. “... I’m really not sure how important they are in the long run.”

Junior Seth Cohen agreed, but added that he is skeptical of their benefits during the college applica-tion process.

Rexford noted this concern, adding that colleges like to be sure that all of their students share some of the same basic skills.

“Some of the top colleges won’t let you place out of English because they want to mold you into the type of writing that they want done,” Rex-ford said. “They want the students taught in the manner that they’re teaching at their school, especially if a student is continuing in that subject area.”

Despite the many benefits to AP courses and the tests that go along with them, the decision to cut AP courses from the curriculum was necessary.

Dean of Students Roslyn Landy was a part of the discussion when it took places in the 1990s.

“We decided we did not ap-

by jonah shrockreporter

Advanced, but not

Advanced Placement

news • the lion’s tale • 05

prove of AP philosophically; it did not allow teachers to teach in any depth,” Landy said. “[The course] was focused on the test, [so] we got rid of it.”

The learning style promoted by the AP courses was also something that the administration disliked.

“AP exams are very rigid,” Landy said. “It’s a lot of memoriza-tion. Let’s take history, [for exam-ple]. A lot of facts, dates, names [and] places, but that’s not what our education is. [The purpose of] our education is to teach you to think, to teach you to analyze things.”

Assistant Principal and Director of Studies Robert Snee said that although JDS does not offer them, there is still value in the AP cours-es. Teachers still look to see what is being taught in AP courses when writing their own curriculum.

Snee said that JDS is proud that teachers can make their own choices about how to teach.

“There is no curricular authority outside telling them, ‘no you must follow lockstep in this particular pattern,’” he said.

He added that at JDS, educa-tion is comprehensive enough for students to be able to succeed on AP exams themselves.

“A lot of [students’ success], I’m sure, is attributable to the fact that we have teachers who are willing to spend extra time outside of class,”

Snee said. “[They] make sure that the students understand what is expected of them on AP exams [and] understand what the structure of the AP exam is.”

Sophomore Tessa Silverman, however, is not as confident in the school’s ability to adequately prepare students for standardized tests like the AP exam.

“I think that we’re at a disad-vantage since we don’t have the AP courses [because] they do teach to the test,” Silverman said. “I think in general just because our school doesn’t really have a curriculum that’s prepared for these tests we’re not as ready as kids in public school who are taking AP classes.”

Because of this deficiency, Sil-verman is apprehensive about taking standardized tests like the AP exam.

“I know that we haven’t really learned, in depth at least, most of what’s going to be on the test,” Silverman said. “It’s kind of a scary concept to go into this exam not really having been prepared for it. It requires a lot of extra studying on your own.”

Nechin is taking the Chemistry and Physics B AP exams in May. She disagreed with Silverman and said that teachers have been really helpful.

“They’ll do little courses after school to prepare and help you study,” Nechin said.

Nechin believes that having an AP course would not have improved her test taking experience.

“I have friends in public school that are taking AP classes and they find it so much more stressful,” Nechin said. “I’m having fun taking the classes that I’m taking and I think I wouldn’t have as much fun if [the teachers] were teaching to the test.”

Cohen, who attended Wootton High School for two years, agreed that taking such structured classes would be stress-inducing.

“AP courses are really struc-tured,” Cohen said. “Having taken [an AP course] I can say that the way that they teach the material here versus the AP [course] is different. JDS thinks learning more creatively and freely is the better way to go. And I agree.”

Editor’s note: The charts above are a graphic interpretation of the results of a survey conducted by The Lion’s Tale of 106 students.

Despite being one of the most exciting days for the CESJDS com-munity, Yom HaAtzmaut, otherwise known as Israeli Indepedenance Day, has had more than its fair share of ugly moments.

After much deliberation on the subject of mosh pits by various facul-ty members, the decision was made in 2012 to give a point deduction to the classes that displayed such disor-derly conduct during the upcoming Zimriyah celebration.

“Mosh pits are disgusting,” freshman Shira Panitch said. “[I think] they are really gross and dangerous.”

The administration is aware of these concerns and has reformed Zimriyah as a result.

“We try to remind the students that they need to be safe and respect-ful,” Director of Jewish Life Miriam Stein said. “We want people to have a good time, but with dignity ,and not totally lose it.”

The “mosh pit” rule was only the first of many changes made to Zimriyah. Faculty members also felt that JDS had more to offer.

“We recognized how much musical talent there is within the community,” Stein said. “Why not make another opportunity for people who love music to showcase their talent also?”

The faculty song was added to Zimriyah this year as a symbol of the entire school coming together, not just the kids.

“Not in competition, but the faculty sang a number of songs to include us in the Kehillah also,” Stein

said.Another major change that has

happened this year to the Zimriyah schedule is the skit. After another long period of deliberation on the subject of the skit, it was decided this year that it would not be part of the day.

“The skit wasn’t a very positive component of the day,” Stein said.

Junior Robert Ost agrees that the skit was not the best part of Zim-riyah in previous years.

“Sometimes the skits can get kind of tedious,” junior Robert Ost said. “Without them there was a good brisk pace [to Zimriyah] that made it very enjoyable.”

According to the students and faculty members, the new changes to the school’s Zimriyah celebration have been very positive in an already exciting and fun filled day.

“I love how the whole school gets so excited about it,” Stein said. “It’s something that’s really memo-

rable that the kids walk away with and they remember how we celebrate Yom HaAtzmaut.”

06 • the lion’s tale • chadashot

Changing the rules at annual Zimriyah celebration

On the warm spring morning of April 8, most teens got up, ate breakfast and went to school. They did not know that there was anything particularly special about that Monday morning. They did not know that it was Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day.

For most teens, that warm spring day was nothing out of the ordinary, but for CESJDS students, it was one of commemoration and mourning. As soon as students walked through the door, they were immediately struck by the somber mood.

As they walked on, they saw foreign names and pictures lining the

halls, along with phrases like “Never Forget” and “Unto every person there is a name.”

Each year, the sophomore class leads the observance of Yom HaSho-ah. This year, the Class of 2015 fo-cused on the theme of names, which was chosen by Israel’s Holocaust Museum, Yad Vashem.

This year’s theme resonated with freshman Talya Kravitz.

“I think it was a really good way to have us understand the depth of the day,” Kravitz said. “It’s usually really generalized and very broad.”

Eighth-grader Reuben Winston agreed with Kravitz.

“I thought it really touched on each individual that suffered, and made us remember them not just as a whole, but as individuals,” Winston

said.The victims’ names lined the

school walls. Each student had a poem posted on his or her locker that was written by a Holocaust survi-vor. Many minyans recited special prayers specific to the Holocaust.

Immediately after minyan, the entire student body went to the gym, where they were told that they would receive a photocopy of an identifica-tion card of a Holocaust victim. The names would in some way resemble their own, so that the students could feel a stronger connection to the victim.

During Kehillah, students got the chance to find out more about the person whose identity card they carried. Students drew pictures of their assigned person after reading

their physical descriptions on their identification cards.

In addition to name, birth date and hometown, the identification cards carried descriptions of hair and eye color, nose size, mouth size and other physical characteristics.

Junior Alyssa Rothfeld felt that the activity helped her feel a stronger connection to her assigned person.

“It definitely did [help],” Roth-feld said. “I got to know my person and what he looked like.”

The day concluded with an as-sembly in which students recited po-ems, performed a song that had been written for the purpose of remem-bering the Holocaust, recited quotes and showed a video of Holocaust survivors describing what it was like to get their identities stolen from

them by the Nazis. The assembly concluded with a steering message to continue remembering and telling the story of the Holocaust.

Sophomore Abigail Israel helped run the program because she felt like it was her responsibility to step up and do something to com-memorate the Holocaust.

“I feel very strongly about the idea that as the third generation we have the responsibility to share peo-ple’s stories and to never forget what happened,” Israel said. “I thought when given the opportunity to speak in front of the whole school and share my beliefs I could not pass that up. It was the perfect opportunity to make sure something that I care so much about was being spread to the entire school.”

by mijal altmannreporter

by shira ungarchadashot editor

Commemorating individuals among millionsphoto provided by Kimberly Dudash

photo provided by Kim

berly Dudash

Juniors Samuel Felsen, Hannah Halpern and Saman-tha Gruhin lead their grade in chants and songs as they enter the gym for Zimriyah. The Class of 2014 won second place in this year’s competition.

chadashot • the lion’s tale • 07

Jerusalem, if I forget you Yom Yerushalayim not observed like other holidays

You have three presents sitting in front of you, all beautifully wrapped, and you want all of them. Unfortunately, you can only have two. Which do you choose?

This is the dilemma that the adminis-tration faces when choosing which Israeli holidays to stage major events on. Of Yom HaAtzmaut, Yom HaZikaron and Yom Yerushalayim, the latter is the one which annually falls by the wayside because, as Director of Jewish Life Miriam Stein put it, “you can’t prioritize everything.”

Yom Yerushalayim commemorates Israel’s capture of the Old City of Jerusalem (and with that, the Western Wall) in the Six Day War of 1967 and the subsequent unifi-cation of Jerusalem under Jewish control for the first time in 2,000 years.

“Jerusalem and the Old City are the ultimate core of Jewish history and Jewish identity,” Stein said. “That’s where it came to its culmination with the Temple.”

Although there will not be an assembly as there are on other days, “it won’t feel like a normal school day,” Stein said. “There will

be a celebratory feeling. The environment of the day will celebrate Jerusalem.”

Stein made clear that, even though Yom Yerushalayim is a politically sensitive holiday, the decision not to do a full cele-bration is not political.

“I have never heard anybody [in] the administration put any sort of kibosh on celebrating due to political reasons,” Stein said. “I think we feel a thousand percent justified [in celebrating it].”

In the plans this year are discussions in Kehillahs and serving Israeli food for lunch. Teachers are free to discuss Jeru-salem in their classes as well if they feel so inclined. And of course no Israel-related holiday would be complete without deco-rations, which Hebrew teacher Lea Magali will be overseeing. Also, according to Stein, there will be musical bells during the day.

However, some students feel that this is not enough.

“I think that there’s a standard set by how much we do for Yom HaAztamaut and Yom HaZikaron, so it’s a little bit disap-pointing that we fail to meet the mark for Yom Yerushalayim,” sophomore Tessa Silverman said. “I think that love for Israel

is one of the principles of the school, so you would expect that they would make more of an effort with this holiday.”

Eighth-grader Josh Abramowitz sided with the administration’s approach.

“It’s not as important as Israel’s birthday and I feel like Yom Yerushalayim is more important for people in Israel than it is here and we don’t need to focus on it as much because of that,” Abramowitz said.

Junior Yael Green emphasized that Yom Yerushalayim should be celebrated equally as a matter of education, if for no other reason.

“We should treat it like any other hol-iday like Yom HaShoah or Yom HaZikaron because not enough people know about it and it’s important to know about it,” Green said.

Stein said that if there was something she lamented about the current policy, it is the “missed opportunity to educate.”

“I think you learn so much through experiencing,” Stein said. “Whatever we do on Zimriyah is much more memorable and powerful than whatever you would have done in class that day.”

by stu krantzmanaging editor

photo provided by Pablo Taking Pictures via Creative Commons

08 • the lion’s tale • in-depth

Sleep“Instead of watching TV or doing homework right before you go to bed, read a book to relax your mind.”

- History teacher Eytan Apter

Nutrition“Eating breakfast is “breaking-a-fast” or fast-ing period; it is considered the most important meal of the day because it provides your body and mind with essential nutrients it needs to function properly and to be productive.”

- Health and Exercise Science Department Chair Steven Forestieri

Exercise“Physical activity is the best relief from being overwhelmed mentally. I would just alternate every day, little exercise, study, little exercise, study, to clear your mind so you can go on with a fresh face.”

-Science teacher Alex Smolin

photo illustration by David Kulp

in-depth • the lion’s tale • 09

Her mind goes blank. All worries about homework and school vanish. She sprints outside to meet her devoted teammates. Junior Hilary Druckman is ready to lead her team through practice. Although Druckman is mostly running for fun, her exercise also benefits her mental well-being.

Throughout the course of their high school careers, many students have difficulty coping with the intense and ever-present stress of school. What most students do not realize is the effect their nutrition, sleep and general health have on their stress level. While for some students these factors make them more stressed and anxious, others, like Druck-man, find them to be a good way to take their mind off school work.

“I am able to finally let my mind turn off [when running],” Druckman said. “Instead of thinking about all the pressure and things that have to get done, I can think about having a good run and doing something physically active instead of mentally active.”

This connection that Druckman re-fers to between an active mind and body is a cloudy concept that scientists have had some difficulty defining.

According to the website of the Mayo Clinic, an internationally-renowned health institute, “virtually any form of ex-ercise, from aerobics to yoga, can act as a stress reliever. If you’re not an athlete or even if you’re downright out of shape, you can still make a little exercise go a long way toward stress management.”

Druckman has already benefited from the positive results of staying active highlighted by the Mayo Clinic study.

“[Running] feels really good after you have been sitting all day,” she said. “It is important to be able to run around and build your strength, build your lungs to have a fully healthy functioning body

and ability to concentrate.”Health-conscious science teacher

Alex Smolin agrees. As a student, Smo-lin discovered how he could succeed in studying after a long stressful day.

“Physical activity is the best relief from being overwhelmed mentally,” Smolin said. “So I would just alternate everyday -- little exercise, study, little exercise, study -- to clear your mind so you can go on with a fresh face.”

Smolin is not the only teacher who has learned the positive effects exercise can have on his life. Health and exercise science teacher Carolyn Holmes also finds that exercise is a good way to relax.

“[During my free time] I run and do yoga,” Holmes said. “[I like yoga so much] because it is relaxing for me and I can get a pretty intense workout without the physical strain on my body, so I can feel great and energized but at the same time relaxed.”

This notion Holmes mentions — being able to exercise and simul-taneously feel relaxed — is key, especially when Druckman describes her love for running.

“When I am out run-ning, I don’t have to wor-ry about anything else. I don’t have to worry about school work, friendships, parents, etc. ... I am able to love and breathe and soak in all that is around me. Being able to forget about the pressures of life is so necessary,” Druckman said.

However, for some students, the problem is not getting themselves to do the exercise, the problem is finding the time.

“This year the amount of work that I [have] is so much that I was contemplat-ing quitting track,” junior Sara Bend-er-Bier said. “I’ve been staying up so late working that it’s hard to find the energy to do those sports.”

Students also find that their level of stress harms their performance in after-school activities.

“I’ll be playing and having a good time and then I’ll think about my work and it won’t keep me as focused as I should be,” freshman Brett Halpern said.

The amount of school work students have not only affects how often they exer-cise, but it also takes a huge toll on their sleeping patterns.

“Well, all the work given in junior year, it makes you very stressed and just doesn’t give you time for sleeping,” junior Samantha Gruhin said. “I mean, you stay up until 11, 12 and even 1 a.m. and that leaves you, what? Five hours of sleep?”

History teacher Eytan Apter under-stands this complaint, common among students; however, he believes that it is possible for students to get a reasonable

amount of sleep with the current level of homework.

“Don’t wait until the last minute to do your homework,” he said. “Rest is more important than getting it done.”

Due to a low amount of sleep, stu-dents must search for other ways to stay in good health.

“Eating breakfast is breaking a fast or fasting period,” Health and Exer-cise Science Department Chair Steven Forestieri said. “It is considered the most important meal of the day, because it pro-vides your body and mind with essential

nutrients it needs to function properly and to be productive.”

However, for some students, not eating isn’t the problem. Sophomore Gabriela Morell-Zucker finds that she snacks excessively when she is stressed.

“Especially after school, [on my way] to [ice dancing] practice, I eat instead of doing my homework because I’m over-stressed and it’s hard to focus,” Morell-Zucker said.

However, some students find it to be the complete opposite. Sophomore Hannah Jacobs recognizes how stressed she is, and eats healthily because of it.

“If I eat healthy [food] then I’m already in a concentrated state of mind,” Jacobs said. “... And that state of mind usually translates into being productive.”

Spanish teacher Deby Kijak heeds Jacobs’ advice.

“I try to always eat salad,” Kijak said. “I feel lighter and I don’t feel like taking a nap after lunch. I have more energy, I feel much better. Not so lethargic.”

Smolin agrees that nutrition is an-other important factor of students

health. According to Smolin, students are growing and because of this your body is using the resources from the food you eat to build itself.

“I tend to think that if you put in good building materials you will have overall a healthier body,” Smolin said.

“Instead of thinking about all the pressure and things that have to get done, I can think about having a good run and doing something physically active instead of mentally active.”

-junior Hilary Druckman

Sweating the stress awayA simple way to boost health and grades

by sj hyman and hannah wexlerreporter and entertainment editor

additional reporting by maddie dworkin and haley lerner

in-depth editors

10 • the lion’s tale • features

Open my eyes to find my cat sitting on me. I’m not defined by cats. Make an elaborate breakfast to reward myself for being such a cool and

collected person. Need to pick up my carpool in t-minus two minutes. Challenge accepted. Look down at my

clothes and realize I’ve worn this outfit before. Shake my head. Sigh in disbelief. Head to the library to remind Mrs. Zemsky that she

promised homemade hamentashen. If I don’t get my hamentashen, I’m not returning my library book. Eat my lunch while overhearing Mr. Dworin say that history papers are due this week. Open my Google Doc. It is empty except for one paragraph about how

amazing pizza is. No, my topic is not pizza. French. Sloff is con-fused and attempts to ask questions in French. No one, Sloff included, understands what she says.

Visit math lab solely to be surrounded by math. Ms. Ball decides this is excellent and writes my quote on the board in a fancy font. Math

lab. Go on a tangent (LOL get it?) and tell Mr. Smedinghoff I had deep-dish pizza for the first time. He becomes extremely happy, then sad, because there is no pizza like Chica-

go-style pizza. Amen. Ar-rive in Physics. Forget calculator. Rush to locker to retrieve said calculator. Decide sweatshirt is a must. Stop in alcove. Find

everyone playing Running Fred.

Check my fantasy baseball team stats. Return to class only to hear the

bell. Awk. Walk in to Ms. Armstrong’s class to find her wear-ing a rockin’ outfit as usual. Discuss my fondness for “The Great Gatsby” before

accidentally ruining the ending for everyone ... again ... Head to the base-ball field to tend to any injuries that occur during practice. I honestly don’t know where the team would

be without my help. Silently give myself a pat on the back for my hard work. Come inside to the school’s workout room that I have just discovered.

Walk at a steady pace for seven minutes before increasing the incline on my t-mill (short for treadmill) to .5. Aw yeaaa.

Procrastinate with real homework by doing SAT work. What is my life ... ? Run to a cappella practice to find that everyone is just eating bread and drinking Arnold Palmer.

Eat leftover Thai food while watching a video by Vlogbrothers about “The Great Gatsby.” Feels like I’m kind of doing work. Take

this opportunity to watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse with my foreign sister. Read intellectual BuzzFeed and Thought Catalog

articles. One was just about chubby cheeks.

Make a mental note to do math homework during minyan, phys-ics during lunch, and SAT practice during

study hall. Get distracted by senior jersey ideas. Look at the spreadsheet only to realize my slot has already been filled in. Grand.

Take fresh cookies out of the oven. Select the perfect Instagram filter before posting photo of said cookies on Facebook and waiting for the influx of likes. Ah, yes: “bring to alcove tmrw?? :)” LQL.

Not a chance. Snap-chat Sloff a picture of my weary, ju-nior-year-ridden face. Caption: “This year can be over now.”

Wake up because of a nightmare that we forgot to study for a quiz. #junio-ryearprobz

Nat, 11:57 p.m.

Juniors Sara “Sloff” Kresloff and Natalie “Nat” Mark catalogue their daily (mis)adventures during their hardest year of high school.

Sloff, 6:30 a.m.

Sloff, 7:18 a.m.

Nat, 7:45 a.m.

Sloff, 9:32 a.m.

Nat, 9:45 a.m.

Nat, 11:15 a.m.

Sloff, LUNCH

Nat, LUNCH

Sloff, 1:47 p.m.

Sloff, 2:50 p.m.

Sloff, 4:07 p.m.

Sloff, 5:02 p.m.

Nat, 5:07 p.m.

Sloff, 5:59 p.m.

Nat, 8:25 p.m.

Sloff, 8:50 p.m.

Nat, 9:22 p.m.

Sloff, 10:36 p.m.

Sloff, 9:30 p.m.

Sunflower Bakery prepares young adults with developmental or other cognitive disabilities for employment through skilled on-the-job training, internships and employment services.

Each month Sunflower Bakery will deliver our yummy baked goods to your school. Your son or daughter will bring them home to help enrich your Shabbat (and you won’t need to make des-sert!).

View our wide assortment of cookies, bars, cupcakes, cakes and specialty items at www.sunflowerbakery.org!8507 Ziggy Lane, Gaithersburg, MD 240.361.3698

A day in the life of a stressed out junior (or two)

Nat & Sloff, 2:30 a.m.

Nat, 10:15 p.m.

Learning loveMarried JDS alumni revisit their shared high school years

Daniel Brujis (‘05) and Rachel Brujis (‘05) enjoy a the bride and groom’s dance during their wedding celebra-tions. The Brujises were married on February 17, 2013, after having dated in high school and college.photo provided by Daniel and Rachel Brujis

features • the lion’s tale • 11

Not every student ends up marrying his or her Prom date. Most people don’t marry the boy next door. But sometimes, that girl sitting across from you in math class becomes you future wife.

Tammy Glatz Landy (‘98) and her future husband Jonathan Landy (‘91) started carpooling to CESJDS as children. Now, they are married with three children, all of whom attend JDS.

Glatz Landy believes their early childhood friendship as neighbors has served as an important basis for their marriage.

“We’ve been friends for a really long time [and] we’ve known each others’ families,” Glatz Landy said. “There’s a real solid friendship be-neath it all.”

Glatz Landy has found that people are surprised to learn of the origins of the relationship.

“Not many people marry the kid down the street and still stay in the same city,” she said. “I think [our common background] had a really positive impact and it’s been really nice.”

Jordana Ravick (‘98) did not begin dating her husband Eric Feder (‘98) until their senior Israel trip, but their friendship began long before that.

“We like to joke that we met in our second grade class,” Jordana said. “… We [later] became really close friends through joining the [school] a cappella group.”

Jordana and her husband both feel that JDS had a strong influence on their childhoods.

“To us, JDS was a home grow-ing up,” Jordana said. “…We would

love to send our kids [here] one day. We just still feel really connected [to JDS] as an institute and as a place that kind of nurtured us.”

Daniel Brujis (‘05) and his wife Rachel (‘05) also started dating in high school. The couple attended Prom together both junior and senior year, and reconnected later during their sophomore year at college.

Daniel Brujis enjoys the fact that JDS provided them with a com-mon set of friends.

“Two of my groomsmen [at my wedding] were friends of mine from JDS and … I’m almost certain [Ra-chel] would consider them two of her best friends as well,” he said.

Like the Landys, current JDS college counselor Dorie Ravick (‘01) and her husband Jacob (‘01) attend-ed JDS together. The two didn’t date in high school, but started to do so after college.

“My mom and sister joked that he’s the boy next door who waited long enough,” Ravick said.

The Ravicks attended soph-omore Prom together, as well as a formal during their freshman year in college. Today, their shared mem-ories of JDS remain a large part of their relationship.

“In a very nerdy way, Jacob and I will sit around sometimes and remember what certain classes looked like, or something will come up about JDS, or I’ll tell a story about work and he’ll say, ‘Oh, do you remember that time?’ and he’ll bring up … a rabbinics class we had,” Dorie said. “And we’re like, ‘how are we 30 years old and sitting around talking about our rabbinics class?’ We wouldn’t be able to do that without JDS.”

Daniel Brujis also believes that he and his wife’s shared experiences in high school have enriched their relationship.

“When I talk about my crazy math teacher she knows exactly who I’m talking about and when I talk about how much fun we had on the Israel trip she understands,” he said. “… High school’s a big part of your life and the fact that it’s a shared one is a very nice thing.”

Glatz Landy found that the Jew-ish aspect of JDS played an import-ant role in establishing a connection.

“There was a foundation that we had a strong, similar background of going to a day school but the way I think it impacted things later was that we both knew where we came from [and] we both had a strong Jewish identity from going to JDS,” she said.

Dorie Ravick agreed, adding that “education-wise and also just culturally and spiritually and emo-tionally, we wouldn’t have who we are … without the piece of JDS.”

Even today, JDS’s influence on these couples is still evident.

“It’s a really special thing that we’ve known each other so long,” Jordana said. “… I think just the fact that we have so many shared mem-ories and so many shared points of reference is something unique and something we still carry with us in our relationship.”

Correction: An earlier version of this article misidentified Jordana Ravick as Jordana Feder. Addi-tionally, facts have been updated to accurately reflect when Dorie Ravick and her husband began their relationship. The Lion’s Tale regrets these errors.

by dina rabinovitzcopy editor

12 • the lion’s tale • features

Procrastination? Eh, you can read this later.

It is midnight, and your assign-ment is due tomorrow. But before focusing on homework, Facebook draws you in. You mindlessly scroll down your News Feed, expecting to enjoy a quick, five minute break. Two hours later, you are left with a half-written paper and five hours before your alarm will sound the next morning.

Whether at home or at school, procrastination can be hard to prevent, but many students have discovered how to beat the habit and avoid late night homework crises.

“I usually have a parent or [someone] sit behind me to make sure I stay focused,” eighth-grader Nadav Kalender said.

Some students prefer their own self-control to a parent’s help. Sophomore Lauren Spiegelman has learned how to prevent procrastina-tion and encourage productivity.

“Definitely do everything that you want to get out of the way first,” Spiegelman said. “If you want to work out, if you want to eat, anything you want to do that doesn’t have to do with work, get it out of the way. I think it really saves time, because when you are anxious, you take longer to do your work, and you’re thinking about [other things], so you get off topic.”

Sophomore Daniel Brandsdorfer has a different approach to avoiding procrastination.

“I try to get [homework] done right after I get home from sports and try to resist the pull that Face-book and other websites naturally

have,” Brandsdorfer said. For many, it is not easy to

rely on self-control to complete an assignment on time. Eighth-grader Ariella Kulp is more efficient when she sets goals.

“I set a timer on my calendar [on my phone and computer], and it [reminds me] that I have to do my homework,” Kulp said. “Then I have certain time periods that I have to start and finish it by, and that gives me another deadline.”

Other students use SelfCon-trol, a program that allows them to restrict access to certain distracting websites in order to concentrate on their work.

Freshman Jonah Gordon uses the application to focus on his work.

“On a computer, you can’t find your way around [SelfControl],” Gordon said. “You just have to focus on what you are doing, and you do not have any options besides what you leave for yourself.”

In addition to restricting her computer access, freshman Ariela Diamond tries to avoid other tech-nology as well.

“I have a talk with myself and say, ‘Ariela, you need to do this work right now,’” Diamond said. “I close out all the tabs like Facebook and stuff like that, I turn off my phone, and then I do my work.”

Although avoiding procrastina-tion can be tough, junior Robert Ost feels that the effort is worth it.

“It feels good to work hard,” Ost said. “Even if while doing it, it doesn’t feel as good, when you see everything you’ve done and that you have done so much, it just feels good to have accomplished so much.”

by emma hofmanreporter

Methods for beating Internet distractions

“I know [Facebook] can be very time-consuming and people can really be sucked into it for hours. It’s

also addictive finding what your friends are doing.”

- junior Barak Bader

“[A] website that no one really uses is Cybernations. You get to make your own country, and sometimes I

would rather manage my own country than do homework.”

-sophomore Jeffrey Becker

“Hulu [is really dan-gerous] because more videos keep popping up after [your video is over].”

-sophomore Hannah Jacobs

“Let’s say you are not exact-ly doing anything in class.You can just scroll through and see what other people

are doing! I honestly do it just to waste time.”

- freshman Elianna Bernstein

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entertainment • the lion’s tale • 13

This haiku is about all of the great aspects of poet-ry honored during National Poetry Month. National Po-etry Month is an annual celebration of poetry sponsored by the Academy of American Poets. It has been cel-ebrated every April since 1996, with the goal of bringing to the public’s attention the wide range of poet-ry that exists and continues to be made every day.

CESJDS provides opportuni-ties for students who enjoy writ-ing and reading poetry to publish their work in one of the school’s two award-winning literary magazines: Collage, for middle school students, and Reflections, for high school students.

Juniors Juliana Isaac and Leah

Schwartz are co-editors-in-chief of Reflections. Isaac loves the confes-sional nature of poetry and often uses it to express her thoughts and feelings.

“I like poetry because it is a dif-ferent way of looking at a common emotion,” she said. “Take love po-etry, for example. Everyone knows about love. There are emotions that people know and see them in a new way when they are in a different written form.”

While Isaac loves poetry’s emo-tional content, Schwartz appreciates poetry as a medium for expression

and believes that the rigid structure allows for greater creativity and better writing.

“I think that all media are re-stricting in their own way and often having restrictions on you makes

you more creative, since you’re forced to work within these tight bounds. You have to really figure out what you were trying to say,” Schwartz said.

Some students find avenues for their expression outside of school. Junior Hannah Halpern explores her love for poetry through her participation in the D.C. Youth Slam Team, a team that competes in slam

poetry com-petitions.

Halpern said that in slam poetry, “there is less metaphorical speak and less talk about nature and more about your life and experiences and making a statement about some-thing through your performance.”

Halpern enjoys this specific genre because having a person up on stage telling his or her story is an exciting way to experience poetry.

In addition to providing outlets for budding writers to showcase

their work, the English Department also provides a Creative Writing dis-tribution course for juniors and se-niors who want to develop their own unique voices and writing styles. This semester, English teacher Kate

Armstrong is teaching one of the classes. Armstrong started writing seriously in high school after being inspired by a Creative Writing class and is now teaching the material

that continues to inspire her.In her Creative Writing classes,

Armstrong teaches her students to read, understand and emulate poet-

ry stylistically. In order to connect her students to the poetry, Armstrong tries to appeal to its human aspect.

“You read a poem,

or you read a book, or a story, or a journal entry, and there’s that mo-ment of recognition when you read something that someone else wrote and think: ‘They understand me and they understand my experience. I didn’t think anyone else had ever felt that way or thought that way, but they did,’” Armstrong said.

“That’s where I always try to start, no matter what the poem or [who]the poet is, no matter what the con-tent is: appreciating that, at its bare bones, poetry is about capturing the human condition and exploring the

human experience.”Armstrong quotes one of her

favorite poems of the moment, “No Man Is An Island” by John Donne, elaborating further on the human

element of poetry and its role in her teaching.

“‘No man is an island, wholly unto himself.’ It’s that idea that we feel so different and so isolated from each other but at our core we’re all the same,” she said. “We’re all part of the same human experi-ence. We’re all just trying to make our way through the world. I think

poetry reminds us of that. It reminds us

that we are all more similar than we are different, and what happens to other people is just as important as what happens to us because we are all connected in some way. Poetry feels like an expression of that, the way we’re all connected.”

English Chair Thomas Worden

teaches poetry because he finds the challenge of the best way to teach it mentally exhilirating. Teaching poetry only increases his affection for the art, and allows him to study deeper than the words themselves.

“I feel like the biggest challenge in teaching poetry is negotiating the balance between content and form,” Worden said. “So, even in the free verse there is

always some way you can organize words and space so that space can help create meaning. That’s what I find so challenging and fun about poetry.”

This joy that Worden feels when reading poetry is exactly the feeling that Armstrong wishes to pass on to her students. Arm-strong’s goal in teaching poetry is to take her students on a journey of exploring and enjoying it, which is the ultimate goal of National Poetry Month.

“Poetry always feels like these brief beautiful windows into the human experience,” Armstrong said. “They are these snapshots of thoughts and feelings that most

people have put down in a way that makes them recognizable. So, what an incredible experience it is to be able to read this beautiful collection of words and to be able to see your-self in them.”

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.-Robert Frost, “The Road Not Taken”

The ultimate outletCelebrating the love and art of poetry during National Poetry Month

by eitan snyderentertainment editor

No man is an island,

wholly unto himself.-John Donne, “No Man Is An Island”

Finding who we areExpressing what we’re feelingAll through poetry

14 • the lion’s tale • entertainment

93%of Americans believe that the arts are vital to providing a well-rounded education.

72%of business leaders say that creativity is the number one skill they are seeking when hiring.

83%of Americans believe that arts educa-tion helps teach children to communi-cate effectively with adults and peers.

Do you believe that the arts are necessary for a well-rounded education? Why or why not?

Absolutely. If you limit your education to just studying the written word and numbers, you limit your ability to com-municate with others. Image, sound, speech and gesture are all languages, every bit as powerful, if not more so, than the written word and numbers. It’s crucial that students explore the arts to expand their ability to communicate. That skillset is something that lasts you the rest of your life whether you go into the arts or whether you go into any other field. In today’s work environment, your creativity is the most important element you are going to bring to any job so you have to be able to be in touch with how you work as a creative individual.

What do you think are some values of the arts that are important for people to learn?

The arts give you a sense of being something larger than what you are. I remember when I was in high school and we visited the Philadelphia Museum of Art and they had these Renais-sance portraits, and I was struck by how the faces, indepen-dent of the clothing they were wearing, looked like people you would see on the street today. It was like, “Hey, that guy looks like my math teacher.” Even though that was 500 years ago, I found a form of connection to it, that these were people back then who looked just like us and were coping with the world around them. The plays of Shakespeare still speak to us today. Yes, humanity has changed a lot over the course of human history, but at the same time, it really hasn’t.

Would you be in favor of a mandatory arts credit for graduation? Why or why not?

Yes, it’s an ongoing discussion at the school. Montgomery County has [a mandatory arts credit]. Most area indepen-dent schools have it. We are rare in that we don’t. I believe that every student should graduate with a year or more’s worth of arts courses regardless of whether we have an arts requirement or not. It is practical. Fourteen states right now require high school students to have a year or more of the arts in order to be admitted to their state universities, so it’s beneficial for students applying to colleges that they have that under their belt. You don’t want to shoot yourself in the foot finding out that you wanted to apply to a state school that has that requirement without having it. So yes, for that alone, but also philosophically I believe it too, because it’s important.

Where would an arts credit fit into students’ schedules?

That’s the ongoing discussion, figuring out what a schedule could, should, and would look like, but the bottom line is that it is important and students should take [arts courses]. It’s important for the college pro-cess, it’s important to build themselves to be stronger employees and it’s important for people to be more culturally aware and it builds community. Studies show that students who have had experiences in formal arts coursework are actually happier adults. There is something about the arts that teaches people how to be happy. It also teaches collaboration. The arts are the ultimate group project. Working together is crucial when you go out into the real world. If you’re in a band, you’ve got to work with other people. If you’re in a show, you’ve got to work with other people. Being in the arts means being a collaborative worker.

The value of arts educationDirector of Arts Education David Solomon sits down with The Lion’s Tale to talk about the importance of the arts to a student’s education and the future of the arts program

What has changed since you became Director of Arts Education five years ago?

First of all, there are more students who are involved, which is so great to see. Second, the number of people who come out to support the arts has grown dramatically. Arts Chai Lights gets 700 to 800 people. We are now in our fourth Arts Chai Lights, so we can rely on a very large audience for that...Five years ago, middle school students were registering for arts courses at about sixteen percent. Now that number is up to eighty-five percent. We have a very large number of ninth graders taking arts classes this year and that is due in part to the encouragement of taking the arts in middle school, so hopefully as students progress through JDS the numbers are just going to improve. We’ve also increased the number of course options for students. We now offer a Graphic Design course that we didn’t five years ago. We offer an Introduction to Piano class that we didn’t offer five years ago...and we also offer theater classes during the day as well, in addition to already strong art and design classes, ceramics classes, photography classes, and our band and our fabulous a cappella choir after school. So, from my perspective and I hope from the students’ perspective, the arts have really blossomed. We are only going to go in an upwards direction, and I’m really proud of the school for investing so much time and commitment to the arts.

79%of Americans agree incorporating the arts into education is the first step in adding back what’s missing in public education today.

sources: Americans for the Arts and National Assembly of State Arts Agencies

sports • the lion’s tale • 15

Op-Ed: Balancing sports and sleep

The more time I have to do my homework, the less I do. This is an unfortunate fact that I have accepted about myself.

Ever since the end of the basketball season, I have more time than I know what to do with. I get home around 4:30 p.m. with hours of time to do homework and loads of other productive activities. Of course, I do none of that. Instead I plop down on the couch and watch the hours go by, telling myself that I still have many more left to do my homework.

This is an effective strategy, until it is 10:00 p.m. and I have not started homework. I then work on

my homework half-heartedly and make my way to bed at about 12:30 a.m. with half of my homework done. I will finish it early the next morning.

Rewind two-and-a-half years. I am starting my first basketball season at JDS and I am very excited. But I am also scared. “If I already go

to bed late without getting home two hours later because of basketball how late will I go to sleep during the season?” I thought. Thank God, the answer was a surprising one. Though I did get home much later during the basketball season, I consistently

went to bed earlier than I had before the season. At first it seemed like a miracle. How was this humanly possible?

I have recently pinned this miracle-like phenom-enon on one simple reason. When I get home during the basketball season, it is late and all of my homework and textbooks lay before me, looking back up at me with an evil grin. I am very frightened by my anthropomor-phic books and I realize that if I do not work diligently, I will be working and facing the wrath of these books till kingdom come.

So begins the phenomenon. Since I have used all my energy during basketball and got a good break from the stress of school, I am

now ready to begin my homework without clowning around. This, cou-pled with the realization that many

sleepless nights are ahead if I do not get to work, induce a healthy stress.

At 11:45

p.m., I fall into bed, completely wiped out but with all, not most, of my homework finished. Maybe it is because I worked productively the night before. Or maybe it is because I knew I would be too tired to wake up early in the morning and finish. Whatever the reason, I finished all of my homework because I got home late because of basketball.

Now more than ever, I miss the basketball season. I miss being in shape, being more healthy in

general, and playing the sport that I love. But now also, as 11th grade is winding down and the amount of studying and test prep is piling up, I miss basketball.

I miss being pro-duc-tive and going to sleep early. Sleep is a beautiful thing. And frankly, I need more of it. Please, basketball season, do come back soon.

by jesse zwebensports editor

“How late will I go to sleep during the season?”

Why I sleep more even though I get home later

sports • the lion’s tale • 16

The door of the Health and Ex-ercise Science department is a sym-bol of permanence, almost always resting open before, during and after

the school day. Inside the door to the left sits Steven Forestieri, a veteran of the school who, like the door of his office, has become a school staple.

Forestieri, the Health and Exercise Science Department Chair and Head Coach of the Boys Varsity

Soccer and Baseball teams, has been a physical education teacher and coach at CESJDS for nine years.

“[Coaching] means that you have the opportunity to make a positive impact and teach life lessons to a group of student-athletes that

are going to benefit them for a lifetime, not just for that game, or that sea-

son, or that sport,” Forestieri said.

Forestieri, also the co-found-er of the National Health and Exercise Science Association, emphasizes teaching life lessons, not just when to steal second base or how to execute the perfect corner kick.

“The real focus for me is that they can take something from that season on with them and

apply it to their everyday lives and use it to experience it in the future in whatever they choose to pursue,” Forestieri said.

That “focus” gets Forestieri rave reviews from his players.

Junior Matan Meloul, who has won one championship in both soccer and baseball under Forestieri, praised Forestieri’s coaching.

“He is very committed; he spends a lot of time with his athletes,” Meloul said. “If they want to stay after and hit extra or put some extra shots on net, he’d be happy to stay.”

Meloul certainly was not imagining his coach’s level of effort, Forestieri admitted.

“When I meet with the team, they have my full attention,” For-estieri said. “The most important thing is to be present with them when you meet with them. Obviously there is preparation that goes into that, as you gain experience and a lot of that stays in your mind with you.”

As a Health and Exercise Sci-ence teacher, Forestieri also teaches Health and Human Development classes in regular classrooms, out-side of his usual domain in the gym or on the field.

“[A] teacher really [is] someone that has had experience, knowledge they can pass on to student-ath-letes, and it’s the same thing in the

classroom,” Forestieri said. “If you have experience, it’s knowledge you can pass on to student-athletes. In essence you are sharing knowledge with them.”

As a long-time coach, Forestieri has seen many teams pass through the school halls, each with its own unique chemistry.

“Every team, season-to-season, becomes different,” Forestieri said. “Every year there is a different dy-namic that’s present and you have to continuously evaluate the dynamics within that team and make adjust-ments throughout the season.”

Of course, Forestieri must change along with his teams.

“[Coaching] evolves over time,” Forestieri said, “and that comes with experience and having time to see what works and what doesn’t, and how to get the most out of the time you have with the student athletes.”

When asked about his favor-ite team, Forestieri refuses to play favorites.

“Every team I have coached has had its unique dynamics, no team has been outstanding and above the rest,” Forestieri said.

Although it can be easy for athletes to get stuck in the spotlight, Forestieri encourages them to main-tain a selfless attitude.

“The more you give, and more you help and do for others, [the more] you gain from that,” Forestieri said.

Coaching with passion and purposeby kobi fodor and stu krantzreporter and managing editor

How to...Get a Chiseled Back

1. Wide Grip Pull Ups,

from dead hang to chest.

2. Sitting Rows.

3. Lie on stomach on

inclined bench and raise

weights away from floor.

4. Close grip

Pull Ups.

Lion’s Tale File Photo

Mr. Smolin’s Workout Tips

Spring recordsBoys Varsity Baseball: 4-4Girls Varsity Softball: 3-5Boys Varsity Volleyball: 5-6 Boys Varsity Tennis: 6-2Coed Varsity Golf: 2-1-1

Varsity Track Championships will be on Monday, May 13.

Health and Exercise Science Depart-ment Chair Steven Forestieri offers words of advice to one of his players. “The more you give, and more you help and do for others, you gain from that,” Forestieri said. He has been coaching at CESJDS for nine years.

Health and Exercise Science Chair Steven Forestieri brings dedication and experience to job

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FOREARMS

Records as of 4/26/2013