Adar is a time of tefillah: Just as the Jews in Shushan prayed and saw great miracles, our actions and words can inspire personal miracles every day. As Chodesh Adar began, so did Central’s Tefillah Week, an opportunity to reflect, reconnect, and restructure tefillah at Central. Each morning opened with a themed tefillah to inspire us to daven a little bit better and gain an extra boost of concentration. Introducing the program last week were members of the JUMP club: Esty Awendstern (’17), Sharoni Borenstein (’17), Shternie Fredlender (’18), Racheli Maidi (’17), Bru Rabin (’17), Sarala Robinzon (’18), Yael Yehoshua (’18), and Sophie Zwiebel (’17).

Using complex poetry as an analogy, the students drew parallels to the discomfort that often accompanies davening when we don’t understand the words and consequently cannot sincerely express our emotions. Using a live online survey, everyone submitted their feedback about their personal connections to davening. The results, conveyed with raw honesty, revealed that everyone needs to work on tefillah. The student representatives explained that this year’s Tefillah Week was crafted for the students, by the students, and with information from the students.

Monday morning featured a silent tefillah, for which students davened at their own paces before coming together in a communal, musical Hallel. Tuesday offered students a choice of davening silently in the café or attending a tefillah workshop led by a member of the JUMP team. As part of a rearranged schedule on Wednesday, special guest speaker Amit Yaghoubi addressed the student body before tefillah to inspire them as they prayed Shacharit afterward. On Thursday morning, everyone moved upstairs to the gym for a “Tefillah Shuffle.” At each chair was a card, drawn from responses generated by students, detailing what a member of our student body davens for. Students internalized these messages as they davened together. The closing “Tefillah Remix” on Friday was led by visiting Ulpana exchange students as they spent their final day in Central. As everyone wore blue and white, guests took everyone on a virtual tour of the holiest places in Israel. v

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