Happy Chanukah, Tigers!

27 Kislev, 5775 December 19, 2014

This Week at CJHS

Chanukah Happenings

Happy Chanukah From the PO

CJHS in the Community

This Week in Sports

Alumni in the News

Science Opportunities

CJHS Community Night

Exam Schedule

Sponsored Breakfast

A Taste of Torah

Alumni Trivia

Bright Lights of CJHS

Save the Date

Monday, Dec. 22 -

Friday, Jan. 2

Winter Break Sunday, Jan. 4 - Friday, Jan. 23

Senior Israel Experience Monday, Jan. 12 - Friday, Jan. 16 Winter Exams

CJHS Media

CJHS on Instagram

CJHS Tigers on Instagram

CJHS on Twitter

CJHS Tigers on Twitter

CJHS on Facebook

CJHS Alumni on Facebook

CJHS YouTube Channel

P.O. Corner

The P.O. is pleased to offer the gift card or "Scrip/Gelt" program, designed to help families earn money to apply towards their students' Shabbatonim, Junior Class trip, and Senior Israel Experience. By purchasing gift cards through the school for vendors where you ordinarily shop (groceries, gas, household items, etc), a percentage of what you spend each time will be placed in your family's account to be used for these trips. Gift card orders are placed every Thursday. Please contact Sheri Sandrof at ssandrof@cjhs.org or 847.324.3723 with any questions.

Rabbi Feinsmith's guitar is a-rocking, cookies

are a-frosting, candles are a-twinkling in the

Beit Knesset, and Chanukah has comes to

CJHS!

Fresh

men,

sopho

mores

,

junior

s, and

senior

s

painte

d their

locker

s and decorated their hallways to bring some

holiday spirit, while Engineering Club

sponsored a 3D chanukiyah art challenge and

Gvt. Wasserman and Dr. Berman led the sing-

along with ALL the verses of our favorite

Hebrew Chanukah songs. The sophomore

boys reenacted Judah Maccabee's epic victory

with plastic swords and Nerf battle axes--

unless they were just rehearsing scenes from

Macbeth for Ms. Friedman! Spin the dreidel or

play some improv games at lunch--whatever

brings light into your day!

Each day of the festival

of lights, CJHS honored

the bright lights of our

school, people who have

brought together our

school in new and

important ways to shine

Grandparents and Special Friends Association

Help us get in touch with some very special people in your students' lives! Please reply here with the names, addresses, and emails of their grandparents and/or special friends so we can forward them a membership form to join our "Grandparents and Special Friends Organization". If you provide an email address, they can also begin receiving CJHS e-news. Contact Sheri Sandrof at 847.324.3723 or ssandrof@cjhs.org with any questions.

Sponsor Breakfast

What's better than a birthday celebration with friends? Celebrate your student's birthday or other milestone with a special breakfast at CJHS.

For a donation of $180 (10x chai), bagels, cream cheese, and orange juice will be served to everyone. Announcements will be made in Tefillah and in the dining hall, and the occasion will also

be listed in our weekly E-News and on the school announcement board. If you have any questions, please call 847.324.3713 or email dzidman@cjhs.org. Order forms are available online here.

Quick Links

Our Website

Online Calendar

Trumba Tips

Lunch Menu

light outward to the community. On

Wednesday, Va'ad Tefillah co-chair, Celia

Pivo, invited founding leaders of new clubs to

light the first candle: Justin Lanoff and

Ranan Vales of Film Club and Lucy Cohen

and Lisa Klein of Holla for Challah. On

Thursday, we honored the incredible leaders

of our LGBT organization, Ga'avah, Shira

Romanoff,

Eli

Johnson,

and Sarah

Behn, for

bringing

important

conversatio

ns to CJHS

and fosterin

g an

environmen

t of safety for all of our students. On Friday,

Va'ad Tefillah co-chair Isaac Johnston

honored the freshmen who have had a

leadership role in Tefillah, Hadar Halivni,

Noah Cope, Max Pivo, and Sarah Tenner.

May all of the lights in our community shine

forth!

Happy Chanukah From the P.O.

The CJHS PO

kicked off the

final week

before break

2014-2015 Dates

:: 847.470.6700

with a special Chanukah Breakfast. Much

thanks to our co-chairs Sheila Small and Terri

Kraus for their outstanding planning and

execution! Thank you to Susan Laney for

helping with set-up and to traffic

superhero Ari Rosenthal for delivering the

donuts just in time!

Our Fall CJHS PO activities were a huge

success! Thank you to all of our co-chairs,

volunteers and sponsors! From the beginning

of the year Grade Get-Togethers co-chaired by

Maryl Dayan

and Amy

Mishell; our

inaugural CJHS

PO Book

Discussion co-

chaired by

Susan Laney,

Becky Mati and

Abby Polin;

Faculty/Staff

Appreciation

Rosh Hashanah

Gift Bags and

CJHS PO

Chanukah Gift

Fund co-chaired

by Andrea

Becker and Anne McDonagh; to our fantastic

Chanukah Breakfast, we could not have done

it without the involvement of our amazing

CJHS community.

Save The Date!

We have some great events planned for the

spring semester:

Tuesday, February 17, at 7 pm

Our second CJHS PO Book

Discussion

Second Person Singular, by

Sayed Kashua

A Palestinian who writes

in Hebrew, Sayed

Kashua defies

classification and breaks

through cultural barriers.

Second Person Singular

is a gripping tale of love

and betrayal, honesty and artifice, which

asks whether it is possible to truly

reinvent ourselves, to shed our old skin

and start anew.

Wednesday, March 18, doors open at 7

p.m.

Baking

demonstration and

tasting by renowned

cookbook author,

Paula Shoyer

The author of The

Kosher Baker, The

Holiday Kosher

Baker, and soon to

be released The New

Passover Menu, Shoyer will also be signing her

cookbooks available for purchase. Light

refreshments will be served.

Both events are to take place at CJHS. Stay

tuned for more information. Chag Chanukah

Sameach! Have a safe, healthy and happy

winter break.

Karen Ecanow & Liz Geifman

CJHS PO Presidents

po@cjhs.org

Find the Chicagoland Jewish High School

Parent Organization on Facebook!

CJHS in the Community

Club Gidwitz is rocking the holiday spirit,

lighting candles, singing Chanukah songs, and

munching latkes and sufganiyot with our

neighbors over at the CJE residence. Thanks

to the impromptu choir and the residents who

participated

!

DEAP

leaders

Aviva

Hirsch,

Julia Mati,

Sarah

Gilman,

Emily

Zfrani, and

Emily

Reisler,

have

connected

with

Campus

Kitchens, an

organization

using extra

food on Northwestern's campus to create

thousands of meals for locals in need. A

number of students have volunteered, and

there will be more opportunities to work with

Campus Kitchens next semester.

This Week in Sports

The Ten-Pin Tigers are on a roll! The three

finalists in the recent intra-squad bowling

tournament were senior

Hannah Lynch, junior Gabrielle Pretekin

and sophomore Erin Miller. Dr. Auslander,

our stalwart coach reports, "The final round

saw Erin on fire, bowling her best three games

of the season. Since the season began, 28

members have increased their average, and

everyone is experiencing great success."

Senior assistant coach Larry Bender is joined

by David Weisskopf, Hannah Lynch,

Itamar Broekman, Oliver Friedman,

Matthew Duhlberg, Max Gruenberg, Shira

Forester, and Viktor Cin who bowled

personal high games this round. Ranan Vales

has

become

the all

time

leading

CJHS

bowler,

with a

current

173

averag

e. Man

y

thanks

to

assista

nt

coache

s Larry

Bende

r and

Josh

Kaplin

sky for all their help. Watch for

the community invitational after break!

On the basketball court, the Tigers faced

tough opposition this week against Providence

St. Mel, Chicago Hope, Beacon, and Luther

North. Come out after Shabbat to cheer on

the Tigers against Fasman Yeshiva!

Alumni In the News

CJHS graduates are movin' on up! Mazal tov

to Aaron Zell ('13), seen here at the White

House performing at the presidential

Chanukah party with UPenn's a capella group,

the Shabbatones!

Alumni Trivia

Which of our graduates is the big

name in interscholastic journalism

on Uloop? Hint: on her home

campus, she's a Hawkeye!

Science Opportunities

Seniors--interested in applying for a science

program that allows research and an

opportunity to tour Israel? The Weizmann

Institute of Science is offering a full

scholarship, including airfare, for the 47th

International Summer Science Institute

program held July 1-July 29, 2015 in Rehovot,

Israel. Applications are due Monday, March 2,

2015. Please see Mrs. Levinson for more

information and an application and/or visit

http://davidson.weizmann.ac.il/en/issi.

SUSHI AND SAKE TOO:

2nd Annual

Chicagoland Jewish High School

Community Event

Reconnect with old friends, meet new

ones and see what's happening in the

halls of CJHS

Saturday, January 17, 2015

27 Tevet 5775

7:30 p.m.

Suggested Couvert: $50 per person

RSVP to Michelle Friedman by January 9.

Exam Schedule

Click here for the January exam

schedule. Have a wonderful winter break!

Sponsored Breakfast

Happy birthday to David

Steinberg! Many thanks to

his family for sponsoring

breakfast. Many thanks again

to the generous parents of the

P.O. for sponsoring the Chanukah feast on

Monday!

A Taste of Torah: The Miracle of

the Oil

How did our ancestors know the oil was there? To begin with, Jewish priests don't usually stroll around the sacred precincts, tucking small flasks of

sacred supplies into inconvenient closets on the off chance that someone may yet play "find the

afikomen" with a bottle of wine or a cruse of oil. Moreover, children's literature and associated illustrations have blurred the important point: the

Hellenistic officials and their Jewish supporters were not destroying or disarranging the Temple, but using it! Our enemies desecrated the sacred supplies by using them in the service of Zeus: their worship was abominably treif, but by no means untidy! What use would a thunder god have for a sloppy Temple? The Herculean task of the

Maccabean conquerors was not housekeeping, but rekashering all of the ladles and altars used by the Hellenists for their all-pork Bachanalian BBQ!

The Chidushei Harim alone among midrashim explains the nature of the miracle. The old High Priest, meticulous in his observance of hidur mitzvah, insisted that some of the finest extra-virgin olive oil from the bedek ha-bayit (grounds and maintenance fund) be kept back for his own personal use: this holy gentleman insisted on

bringing his own mincha offering with nothing less than the finest of reserve oils. While board members and congregants everywhere may look askance at this use of communal funds, the High Priest's dedication to his sacrifice seeded

hope in the darkest of times, saving the day when all was lost and nothing but a

miracle would do. When the Maccabees retook the Temple and found all the olive oil poured and stored in treif keilim, the question flew from mouth to mouth: where did the old priest keep his special jars of oil?

A search was made and its results were golden:

one tiny jar of oil, sealed with the High Priest's own seal, tucked away on the top shelf of his secretary's supply closet with a spare set of teffilin, a retired havdalah set, half a cup of semolina, and a vintage

bottle of the 425 BCE Shiraz. Intended for a mincha offering alone, this tiny bottle was not enough to light a lamp for one day, let alone for eight; to the Maccabees, however, an hour of light was better than none at all, and they resolved to make do with what they had. A miracle! The oil lasted for eight days, and the wine had only

improved with age. (Imrei Eliaser!)

And so, concludes the Chidushei Harim, when you do a mitzva, never do it by halves. Make

everything you do as special as you can possibly make it. Do it with style, with beauty, and with the best things you have. After all, who knows what special touch only you can make might spark a miracle for someone else?

--Mrs. Shira Eliaser

Alumni Trivia

Natalie Roytman ('11) is a

senior at the University of

Iowa, majoring in journalism

and international studies. She

is one of the most notable

writers on the Uloop circuit,

covering travel, fashion, and

campus issues. Natalie is an avid

photographer and travels with her friends

whenever she gets the opportunity!

Shabbat Shalom

Candlelighting this week is at

4:03. Shabbat shalom and

Happy Chanukah!

יה, אחינו ה ובשב ר צ אל, הנתונים ב ר כל בית יש

עו דיםה קום ירחם מ ה, המ בין בים ובין ביבש

ה, ומאפלה ,עליהם וח ה לר ר ויוציאם מצ

בוד ה, ומשע א בעגלא ובזמן לאור ת לגאלה, הש

ריב .ק