This spring, Suburban Temple - Kol Ami took a group of twenty-four adults for a ten day visit to Israel. No visit is complete without visiting our sister city Beit Shean. Under the leadership of Anat Sharvit and Zvia Shelly from Partnership 2000, our congregants were hosted to most delicious and wonderful dinners in the homes of some of the community builders of Beit Shean. These visits sparked what will be on-going relationships between our two cities. The next day our congregants planted trees in Beit Shen and visited the area.  Our congregants look forward to continuing the conversations with their new Beit Shean friends via email.

 For the last year, Suburban Temple - Kol Ami has developed a relationship through Partnership 2000 with The Tomer School. Last spring, ten teachers from Suburban Temple - Kol Ami visited the Tomer School and the Beit Shean region to begin to establish an on-going relationship between our students and teachers. This past year the fifth grade classes of Suburban Temple - Kol Ami and Liat Afriat’s  English class continued to write back and forth and share games, jokes, music and art work. During the visit to Beit Shean this spring, we were able to visit with Liat’s class again. This time, we brought with us a project from Cleveland. The students in the fifth grade class had made a quilt for their Beit Shean friends about being a part of K’lal Yisrael. Lisa Kollins (our family educator), Dara Holop (our retreat coordinator) and myself worked with the kids in Liat’s class to create their part of the quilt. I am happy to report that there is now a quilt hanging at Suburban Temple - Kol Ami as well as a quilt for the Tomer School. We look forward to continuing this exchange between the schools and the cities.

Debbie Bram
Religoius School Director
Suburban Temple - Kol Ami