The annual Kinus HaMechanchim will take place online this year, and will discuss preparing our schools for the new school year in a post COVID-19 world.
The Merkos Chinuch Office is bringing the annual Kinus HaMechanchim to the mechanchim/os, since they cannot come to a live Kinus.
On 4-5 Elul, August 24th and 25th the annual Kinus will assume a ZOOM set-up. For two days hundreds of educators will listen to lectures participate in electronic workshops and discussion to prepare themselves for a new school year.
Many mechanchim, principals and administrators have already been hard at work preparing for the coming school year. There have been numerous yeshiva administrators zoom meetings, discussions led by the Merkos Chinuch Office, with the objective of assuring safety for children (and mechanchim) when they return to school. Every school and all educators are taking this challenge with the greatest seriousness. In fact, 98 administrators were signed on the meeting which took place on Monday.
The challenge is tremendous. Children have been away for classrooms since Purim and their education has obviously suffered, especially those who have special needs. Curricula will need to adjusted, skills will have to be relearned or at least brushed up. Schools will need to practice safety as never before. Distancing, protective steps and overall precautions will need to implemented for every school activity.
The ZOOM Kinus will feature professional such as Dr. David Pelcovitz and Dr. Michael Blumenthal who will deal with the safety and psychological issues. Outstanding menahlim such as Rabbi M.M. Greenbaum, Chaim Botwinick, mechanchim such as Rabbis Levi Feldman, Moshe Schwartz, Zalman Raskin and others will discuss classroom management and curriculum. Mashpiim and roshei yeshiva will share divrei chizuk with the hundreds who will be tuned in.
Truth be told. This is an unprecedented time and our educators are doing and tremendous job. Chabad mechanchim and mechanchos deserve a great deal of credit. They put in time and effort, learned new skills and worked harder than ever during the pandemic. The results were impressive too. Whereas roughly 15% of a typical classroom attended Zoom classes in the public-school sector, attendance among yeshivas was in the 90th percentile. Rabbi Nochem Kaplan, director of the Merkos Chinuch office said “It took many hours of preparation for every hour on Zoom and they will tell you the results show it was time well spent”.