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DEDHAM —
On the third floor of the new Rashi School in Dedham is a large music room that essentially represents two of its core values: Kehillah, which in Hebrew means community, and Kavod, or respect.
When planning the school, designer HMFH Architects Inc. asked how Rashi would like to lock up instruments, but school staffers insisted they did not want to lock them up.
The result: Recorders, xylophones and drums will be kept in the open cubbies that were built in the room.
“We trust our kids. Our instruments will not walk away,” said Adrienne Frechter, director of admissions and marketing for the school.
A recent tour of Rashi’s new building in Dedham, on the campus of the senior housing complex, NewBridge on the Charles, offered glimpses into the educational life that will soon play out there. The tour began in the lobby, where all five values will be engraved in a stone wall, including Limud (learning), Tzedek (social justice), and Ruach (spiritual strength).
Over its 2 ½-decade existence, the kindergarten through eighth-grade Reform Jewish day school has developed a distinctive ethos and identity. Now, after 24 years in various temporary locations, it has a permanent home.
“This is our first real home,” Frechter said. “We’ve been the ‘wandering Jews,’ and we finally have a place to stay.”
Not only that, but the envisioned multigenerational campus with NewBridge seniors is about to become reality. There have been two events bringing together Rashi students and NewBridge residents so far, in December and May.
“It’s a nice opportunity for us to mix the generations,” Frechter said. “We’re a pretty age-segregated society, so it’s nice.”
The Campaign for Rashi has raised $27 million toward its goal of $30 million to pay for the school, an 82,000-square-foot building whose stone exterior resembles the Kotel, or Western Wall in Jerusalem. It has three stories facing NewBridge on the Charles, and four stories facing the river. Among the environmentally-friendly components of the LEED-certified building are low-flow toilets; smart lights that go on when you enter a room and turn off when you leave; and hallway doors that can seal a particular section of the school so it can be air-conditioned or not.
The school has ample natural light, such as in the Sukkat Shalom area, whose interior windows bring in light that first passes through the exterior glass of the dining commons down below. The Sukkat Shalom is a place of peace that Head of School Matthew King calls “the living room of the school.”
On the third floor of the new Rashi School in Dedham is a large music room that essentially represents two of its core values: Kehillah, which in Hebrew means community, and Kavod, or respect.
When planning the school, designer HMFH Architects Inc. asked how Rashi would like to lock up instruments, but school staffers insisted they did not want to lock them up.
The result: Recorders, xylophones and drums will be kept in the open cubbies that were built in the room.
“We trust our kids. Our instruments will not walk away,” said Adrienne Frechter, director of admissions and marketing for the school.
A recent tour of Rashi’s new building in Dedham, on the campus of the senior housing complex, NewBridge on the Charles, offered glimpses into the educational life that will soon play out there. The tour began in the lobby, where all five values will be engraved in a stone wall, including Limud (learning), Tzedek (social justice), and Ruach (spiritual strength).
Over its 2 ½-decade existence, the kindergarten through eighth-grade Reform Jewish day school has developed a distinctive ethos and identity. Now, after 24 years in various temporary locations, it has a permanent home.
“This is our first real home,” Frechter said. “We’ve been the ‘wandering Jews,’ and we finally have a place to stay.”
Not only that, but the envisioned multigenerational campus with NewBridge seniors is about to become reality. There have been two events bringing together Rashi students and NewBridge residents so far, in December and May.
“It’s a nice opportunity for us to mix the generations,” Frechter said. “We’re a pretty age-segregated society, so it’s nice.”
The Campaign for Rashi has raised $27 million toward its goal of $30 million to pay for the school, an 82,000-square-foot building whose stone exterior resembles the Kotel, or Western Wall in Jerusalem. It has three stories facing NewBridge on the Charles, and four stories facing the river. Among the environmentally-friendly components of the LEED-certified building are low-flow toilets; smart lights that go on when you enter a room and turn off when you leave; and hallway doors that can seal a particular section of the school so it can be air-conditioned or not.
The school has ample natural light, such as in the Sukkat Shalom area, whose interior windows bring in light that first passes through the exterior glass of the dining commons down below. The Sukkat Shalom is a place of peace that Head of School Matthew King calls “the living room of the school.”
Chairs, desks and other equipment were being wheeled in on dollies during a tour last week with Rashi representatives, 1½ years after construction began. As communications manager Linda Silverstein put it, “School is over Friday. Monday we pack. Tuesday stuff is moving. And Wednesday the staff come to unpack.”
A ribbon cutting was held Sunday. The first day of school is the day after Labor Day, and the official school dedication is scheduled for Oct. 17.
The classrooms for first through fifth grade are focused around a Promethean interactive white board that is connected to a computer to project lessons. A traditional whiteboard and bulletin board are on either side of the high-tech device. Each pair of classrooms for elementary students is connected by a room. There kids from both classes can be brought together for a reading group, for example. School officials explain that this allows students to feel part of the larger peer group of 36 to 40 kids in each grade.
Rashi has an enrollment of 300 students, but has the capacity to grow to 360 students in Dedham.
The science lab looks out on the natural “backyard” of sorts where Rashi pupils will be able to collect data and make observations.
“There’s a vernal pool right out there, the Charles River is here. There’s lots of wildlife and trees. So we’re really excited to bring nature into our curriculum more,” Frechter said, explaining that middle schoolers are taught Earth science in sixth grade, chemistry is seventh grade, and physics in eighth grade.
The building includes a large art room, 10,000-volume capacity library – Rashi is getting its first full-time librarian – and a 450-seat auditorium, designed by the theater director, that has teal, light blue-gray, and deep purple seats and excellent acoustics.
Outside are two amphitheaters that can host assemblies, classes, or worship. A short walk from one of them is what Frechter calls “our fields of dreams. We have never, ever had a home game.”
In its latest incarnation Rashi has been housed at 15 Walnut Park in Newton, and its athletes play games at a YMCA in that city. But now the Rams will have their own gym. This year’s departing eighth-graders won’t be able to enjoy it, but they did sign a beam high in the gym, leaving their mark.
For all the sheen of Rashi Dedham, it is a 96-year-old carved mahogany ark – saved from a Gardner synagogue that closed in 1995 – that provides the school with a crucial, tangible link with local Jewish history. The ark, donated by Carol and Eldon Clingan, sits in the Beit Midrash, Rashi’s chapel.
“We’re not bringing a stick of furniture from the old school. Everything is new,” Frechter said. “And (the ark) gives us a connection to the past.”
Dedham Transcript staff writer Edward B. Colby can be reached at 781-433-8336 or ecolby@cnc.com.
