It’s the season. I remember graduations in the USA. Caps and gowns. Pomp and Circumstance. Even the most low key ones are serious events with some level of formality.
Israeli graduations are not so much.
Of course, a lot of it has to do with what level of education and in which demographic you are in. University graduations are still somewhat formal. We wouldn’t know. Our kids who’ve graduated university here in Israel didn’t even attend their own graduations (much less have us attend). Which was embarrassing for one of them when she was apparently called to accept a certificate for graduating number one in the class—and she wasn’t even there.
So we have basically been to graduations for preschool, elementary school, middle school, and high school. Both here and in the USA (none of our kids finished high school there, but as a yeshiva board member and administrator, I attended many graduations). Like many other things in life, they are vastly different.
Preschool events in Israel last for hours and hours. It doesn’t matter if it is a graduation, a Chanukah party—any event in which parents participate is guaranteed to be a minimum of three hours long. Almost all of which the parents are expected to sit on the kids’ preschool sized chairs.
As for the other events/culminations in the school year, although it has (admittedly) been almost 20 years since we’ve last attended one in America, as memory serves, they usually include some kind of performance or presentation and a ceremony, with family in attendance as an audience.
Here, almost every culmination ceremony is an interactive event. Complete with projects to do or workshops to complete. Siddur parties, Chumash parties, you name it—it’s not just a ceremony, it is an event. Even parent teacher meetings often have some kind of project for the parents to leave for the kids to find on their desks the next morning.
Graduations fluctuate from school to school and also by gender. Primary school is generally much more formal, with a performance by the students and then the presentation of awards and diplomas very much like we had in the USA. Although even those have been known to clock in at 3-4 hours as well.
The difference for those (like most other events here) is the decorum/dress. A suit and tie here are an extreme rarity. People basically show up in their everyday clothes. And any reception afterward is as informal as the people are.
High school graduations are a whole new level of casual. We’ve had five of them (our youngest just graduated last week) and they are all so very different from anything we had in the USA. No matter which kid we are talking about, none of them came close to what we’d have expected from an American graduation.
For some reason, high school graduations here must include some kind of work assignment (and every time I think to myself, “Aren’t we supposed to be celebrating the end of all the schoolwork?”) not just for the kids, but also the parents. And a group discussion. It’s like the teachers feel they need to get in that last chance at teaching before the kids move on.
We just had our last high school graduation, for Moshe, our baby. Moshe’s graduation began at 5:30 p.m. on a Thursday. First item on the schedule? Minchah. With a second Minchah for those who came late.
Then, for the next 90 minutes, each class was assigned to one of the large rooms (we were in the shul/beit midrash) for a class meeting. I can’t call it a ceremony.
Their rebbe taught them for four years—he moved grades with the class. (The homeroom rebbe normally stays with a class for two years. This one had such a great connection with the kids—especially through COVID—that he stayed with them throughout high school.) He opened by speaking about what it meant to him to have been with this group over four years.
He then invited one of the boys to make a siyum on Masechet Sukka. A siyum that the boys had only decided to complete earlier in the week as a surprise for him, with each boy learning several daf. The siyum was followed by boys and fathers singing and dancing.
When the dancing ended, a couple of the students were invited to describe their feelings and what they learned from their rav over four years. It’s at this point that things took on a life of their own and it became “open mike” night at a high school graduation. We’d seen it before with other kids—but it still feels so foreign to us. Essentially, the boys were invited to share their thoughts, if they were motivated to do so.
Once the students had their turn, the teacher turned the floor over to the parents to express their thoughts as well. Which many did. Totally off the cuff. Anywhere from 20 seconds to 3 minutes each, of people simply expressing their appreciation for something the rav did or that the kids got to experience.
Neither Goldie nor I felt confident enough in our Hebrew speaking skills to say anything (plus, I am notorious for hating having to sit through these extremely long rituals and have no temper for it).
At the end of the individual group session, we enjoyed a video slideshow put together by the boys in the class, celebrating their years in high school together. At this point, I would estimate that it was around 7:30 p.m.—yes, two hours into the event.
All the classes (there were four in his grade) came together in the courtyard of the school for an intermission/light dinner reception. After the reception, everyone sat together for the formal graduation ceremonies, which began around 8:00 p.m. or so.
Despite the fact that every class had already had a private session of 90+ minutes in which the students and teachers made presentations and speeches, this ceremony included speeches by students from each class, speeches by the principals, speeches by two parents, a speech by the mayor, and, of course, multiple performances by the “Class Band” (which, hilariously was one kid with a guitar and another with a saxophone).
Finally, at about 9:00 p.m., they began the more than half hour process of calling all the graduates to accept their diplomas. With Ma’ariv and the presentation of a gift to their rebbe at the end, we were there for four and a half hours. Which is pretty normal here.
Oh, and I mentioned that it’s casual? Well, 95% of the boys wore white shirts and dark pants. One actually came in a suit. But 20% or more of those white shirts were t-shirts, most often paired with dark jeans. And while I did say that this was our last graduation, our grandson just graduated three year old preschool and the next cycle begins.
Shmuel Katz, his wife, Goldie, and their six children made aliyah in July 2006. Before making aliyah, Shmuel was the executive director of the Yeshiva of South Shore in Hewlett. You can contact him at shmuel@katzfamily.co.il. Read more of Shmuel Katz’s articles at 5TJT.com.
