Through the stories of key professionals from Jewish schools and institutions in different countries, we seek to highlight the work of individuals and communities and their impact on Jewish education in the region, learn from their experience, and promote quality education that reinforces Jewish identity and contributes to the growth of students. A few weeks ago we talked with teachers and administrators from the Martin Buber School. This time we will be looking at a different institution: The Eliezer Max School in Brazil.

Eliezer Max School, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Two longstanding and well-established schools in the Carioca Jewish community (the Eliezer Steinbarg Brazilian Israelite School, founded in 1954, and the Max Nordau College, founded in 1950), merged in 2001 to create a new institution. The process was arduous and challenging, says Bruno Gottlieb, a former student and today the school’s Administrative Director, because its objective was to amalgamate two institutions each of which came with its own distinctive heritage and profile: the former was characterized by a more humanist and progressive outlook, the latter by its Zionist perspective. “The identity-formation and standardization process took almost 10 years. In this process, the values of Theodor Herzl, Ben-Gurion and Golda Meir were key pillars that were considered fundamental in the schools that merged,” comments Gottlieb.

After considerable effort invested in that overarching mission – to move from being a merger of schools to becoming a new institution with its own identity – Eliezer Max is characterized by having its gaze set on the present and contemplating the society in which it is located, with a view to building a Jewish identity based on unconditional respect for the heritage of the Jewish people and the individual subjectivity of each student. Its mission today is to preserve and maintain a relevant Judaism "that manages to touch people in their identity," as Gottlieb puts it. That is why it is constituted as a “Jewish school of humanist, pluralist tradition, which seeks academic excellence and which postulates the Jewish and universal values of justice, democracy and otherness," add Silvia Zajler Grinstein (Bilba) and Paulo Miragaya, graduates of the Melton Master's degree program and teachers of Judaic Culture at the school.

Looking forward
Regarding the challenges at Eliezer Max, Bilba emphasized the problem of attracting students, in addition to the characteristics of the labor market, which currently demands a large amount of specific content and, in this sense, can make Jewish content seem less relevant. For this reason, many of the school's projects today focus on valuing the human being and integrating Jewish culture with other areas of study. For example, through the interpretation of Torah stories and values, the school addresses contemporary issues and promotes values such as empathy and human relationships.

Technology-related changes present their own challenges to the institution: "Between the 1990s and 2020 technology has revolutionized people's lives, and our challenge is to look to the future without forgetting the past, without forgetting where we come from, what the founders of the school wanted when they decided to create it,” explains Gottlieb, noting also the importance of teacher training and its impact on the institutional culture.

Commitment to Training
For the school, keeping Judaism at the center of the educational endeavor means carrying out projects such as an international trip to Israel for high school students, in order to achieve "a deep dive into Israeli society: its beauty, challenges and complexities," says the director, in addition to committing to ongoing teacher training, accompanied by the Melton Center and its Master's Degree in Education. Since the graduation of some of the school’s teaching staff from the program, in addition to promoting training for other teachers who are currently studying, they have noticed important differences in "the messages that we transmit to families and students and in the way in which we debate Judaism, because we deepen our convictions and add knowledge,” he adds.

Bilba, Coordinator of Jewish Culture for early-childhood and primary education, says that taking the Melton Master's Degree broadened her perspective, through an extensive recommended bibliography as well as teaching her how to find various points of view on the same subject by researching different branches of study (history, philosophy) and different currents of Judaism. Paulo Miragaya, Coordinator of Jewish Culture for primary and secondary schools, considers it a privilege as an educator to be part of topical discussions in Jewish Education in the present, as well as having familiarity with academic works and discussions taking place in the university environment, which he had not previously had access to in his professional training. Both also agree on the importance of the exchange with teachers from all over the world, which broadens their perspectives in their work as teachers and also enriches them as people.

We at the Melton Center are proud to have among our graduates Jewish Education professionals such as Bilba and Paulo, and we are happy to see that the knowledge they gained has an impact beyond the academic space: they are applying it in their teaching spaces and in challenging contexts where the continuity of Jewish Education is a priority and a value that needs continual strengthening.

Thanks to:
Silvia Zajler Grinstein (Bilba), graduate of the Melton Center Master's in Jewish Education, cohort 2021-2022. Coordinator of Jewish Culture.
Paulo Miragaya, graduate of the Melton Center Master's in Jewish Education, cohort 2021-202. Coordinator of Jewish Culture.
Bruno Gottlieb, Administrative Director.