Welcome to another episode of The Jews Next Dor! We have the great pleasure to hear from Professor Shoshana Schechter.

Professor Shoshana is a graduate of Stern College for Women, with a B.S. in both Judaic Studies and English Literature, and holds master’s degrees from Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies and Columbia University School of Journalism.

Mrs Schechter is the Associate Dean of Torah Studies at Stern College for Women and the director of the Mechina program. The Mechina program, which she founded 17 years ago, accommodates students who did not receive a formal Jewish education prior to their enrollment at Stern College.

She has also taught Tanakh and English at various high schools in the New York area. She's a frequent lecturer on topics in Tanakh and has been involved in Jewish outreach programs on four continents. She lives in New Hampshire, New York, with her husband and five children.

Timestamps:

01:30 Teaching Torah in the USSR at 16

09:33 Taking ownership of your Torah

11:54 Parents as role models and Operation Moses

15:50 USSR programs after the fall of communism

20:04 Getting into formal education

27:28 Should Jewish people attend Jewish College?

30:04 Vision for the foundation of the Mechina program

34:47 Bridging academic with non-academic learning

37:14 Fostering relationships with children through learning

46:30 How to make spiritual teachings applicable?

49:44 Convicting high-school students to have relationship with HaShem

55:01 Preparing women for their parenting role

1:00:09 The flaws of the Jewish school system and how to improve it

1:05:02 Technology, information overload, and the problem of wealth

1:09:16 Balancing relationship with discipline

1:12:01 How to develop a relationship with children?

1:16:48 Developing a relationship with HaShem

1:19:33 Teaching Mechina program students

1:23:30 Wrapping up

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Welcome back to another episode of The Jews Next Dor! Rav Chaim Marcus. It is an absolute pleasure to be sitting with Rabbi Chaim Marcus who currently serves as the Rabbi of Congregation Israel in Springfield, NJ, The Director of Yeshivat Reishit’s American Office, and Rebbe at Bruriah High School for girls and Camp Kaylie. Previously, Rabbi Marcus was the S’gan Mashgiach at Yeshiva University and a Rebbe at JEC and Camp Mesorah. He is well known for inspiring his audiences (adults, teens, and children alike) to be the very best Jews that they can be.

In this episode, we discuss various parenting topics and strategies for raising children with strong Jewish values and connections to Tefillah, Shabbat, and Hashem through open communication, modeling behaviors, and finding meaningful ways to engage at different ages.

Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 00:57 Rav Chaim Marcus’s background and family 06:13 How does Rav Chaim parent his children? 08:06 Helping kids connect to Hashem 10:26 How to talk to children about Hashem 15:02 Reasonable expectations from children 18:39 Rav Chamim’s goal as a shul rabbi 24:05 How to make shul exciting for kids? 27:13 Most common parenting issues 32:38 The advice to parents 35:59 The importance of Tefillah

Sometimes the best way to improve as a parent is by learning from our children. How do we do that? Our host, Rabbi Yair Menchel brings a lesson for this week's parenting in the Parsha to teach us this simple but fundamental answer. Good Shabbos!