Staff Appreciation

Supporting Each Other Judgement Free

School is beginning and this year, more than ever, educators in early childhood centers and religious schools need support. A year and a half of changing plans that we worked so hard on, learning entirely new ways of teaching, comforting others while feeling uncertain ourselves, and doing our best to create a sense of community while students are separated into pods or logging into class from their homes has left educators running on fumes.

As we all dig deep to ensure that the start of this school year is as special and exciting as we can make it, our Jewish tradition offers answers as to where we might look for support. Hinei ma tov u’ma naim, shevet achim gam yachad: how good and pleasant it is for brothers and sisters to sit together (Psalm 133:1). We are in this together and we understand one another’s struggles and achievements, as educators, better than anyone else. While early childhood centers and religious schools welcome children to campus at different times and for different programs, the educational leaders of these departments can find time to sit with one another on a regular basis, without a formal agenda. Having this time set aside to speak with someone who inherently understands what we do and the intricacies of the organizations in which we work, can become the extra emotional sustenance that we need to propel us into this new school year.

This year we can make an extra effort to support our fellow educators by sitting together without judgment through:

• Joy: sharing our successes with students and watching their growth, watching our teachers develop professionally, celebrating lifecycle events, enjoy the moments when we get to feel a sense of “normalcy”, and laugh at the silly things that we see and hear when our students are with us.
• Hardship: the personal and professional challenges that Covid creates for educators, the shortage of teachers and money to pay them what they deserve, and the fear of our students, staff, families, or ourselves becoming ill.
• Change: the ways that we have had to learn to adapt to teaching our students in new ways, the ever-changing guidelines and mandates placed on schools, and the ways that many aspects of our jobs have dramatically changed since Covid began.
   

Rose Orlovich, MAEd, MAEd ECE
Director of Education
Lee and Frank Goldberg Family Religious School
Congregation Beth Israel, San Diego, CA

Creating a Culture of Teacher Support and Appreciation

There are many quick, easy and inexpensive (or free) ways a Congregation can show support and appreciation for its ECE and Religious Education professionals.  The only requirement is thought and intentionality.  Below are ideas that participants shared in a Meet Up webinar, facilitated by Susie Wexler (ECE-RJ) and Andrea Fleekop (ARJE).

Things Your Congregation Can Do at No Cost

• Written notes of appreciation from leadership, students, and parents: Use fun shaped sticky notes to write notes of appreciation to teachers.
• Online Google Thank You Note form: Encourage anyone to send a thank you note to teachers – families-to-teachers or colleague-to-colleague.  The comment goes first to the teacher’s or colleagues so that h/she can add additional comments.  The link to the form is shared at the beginning of the school year and periodically throughout the year. Very easy to do and instant! 
• Show interest in your teachers’ lives outside of school:  Celebrate/recognize milestones in their lives, if this is the culture of your school and your temple.  Support them when things are rough.  By doing so, you show them that you value not only their work, but also your relationship.
• Create opportunities for teachers to feel part of the greater Temple community:  Offer free tickets or attendance to school sponsored or congregational events. Create pop-up activities across the educational and congregational communities.  Invite clergy and lay leaders to attend teacher meetings.

Things Your Congregation Can Do at Minimal Cost

• Honor teachers at holiday time: Teachers appreciate the small efforts of leadership – jars of cookie or pancake mixes, tote bags, a Gratitude dinner, Teacher Shabbat, coffee- or tea-tasting.  Some programs have a Treat Cart -- teachers receive a menu to select favorite snacks, and the snacks get delivered like room service.  It’s the thought that counts.
• Provide monthly Pick-Me-Ups, just because:  Little tokens of appreciation go a long way.  Some ideas include Starbucks gift cards, Survival Kits (Emergen-C, hand sanitizer, etc.), gel pens and post-it notes, mini hand lotions, heart socks, fingerless gloves and more. Special treats in the directors’ and clergy’s offices are also a nice way to show appreciation.
• Field Trip to Thrift or Discount Store:  Give teachers $100 total to spend as they wish for their classrooms and curricula.  If possible, set a time that teachers can visit and shop together.
• Offer activities that are purely fun: One colleague suggested having teachers work together to acquire “fun skills,” like juggling, hula-hooping, and jumping rope.

Things That Require Advance Planning and Budgeting

• Offer special perks or benefits of employment:  Allow teachers to enroll their children in early childhood or religious school at a reduced or free tuition rate.  Offer temple membership as a free benefit of employment. Increase teachers’ income by giving them added responsibility, such as mentoring a new teacher.
• Overnight retreat for teachers.
• Treating teachers to a “Teacher Appreciation Dinner” at a nice restaurant.
• Invest in your teachers: Subsidize continuing professional development, Jewish and/or educational-based. 

Useful LInks:

• Teacher Appreciation Week: A culture of appreciation in the workplace
• Culture of positive appreciation
• Teacher Appreciation Week Ideas
• Value of gratitude

Andrea Fleekop RJE
Director of the School for Jewish Living
Temple Beth El of Pensacola
Pensacola, FL

Susie Wexler
BJBE Early Childhood Program at the Chava Center Director
B’nai Jehoshua Beth Elohim
Deerfield, IL

December 2019