Bright Start to Year for Dnepropetrovsk Jewish School

DNEPROPETROVSK, Ukraine -– Like thousands of schools across the Former Soviet Union, the Jewish community of Dnepropetrovsk also marked the ‘Day of Knowledge’ at the ‘Ohr Avner-Levi yischak’ Day School. Traditionally held on September 1st, the celebration was postponed by two days so that it would not fall on Shabbat. This year’s count of first-graders was twice more than last year, at 45 pupils.

Chief Rabbi of Dnepropetrovsk Shmuel Kaminetsky opened the ceremony, congratulations the youngsters on the upcoming holiday of Rosh Hashanah – the Jewish New Year. The gathering also involved Jewish community Chairman Grigoriy Korol, and Dmitry Apartsev, the Regional Head of the Jewish Agency for Israel ‘Sochnut’, in addition to a number of representatives and officials from the Israel Embassy and other Jewish organizations operating in the region.

Festivities opened with the national hymns of Israel and Ukraine, after which children from the youngest Yeshiva recited the 12 Psukim and Rabbi Meir Ostrovskiy sounded the Shofar. Pupils recited poems and sang songs in Ukrainian, Russian and Hebrew and then heard several exciting announcements – that foreign language teachers underwent upgrading in Boston this summer, that students would engage in an updated language study program, that an additional math class would be introduced for youngest students.

The ‘Ohr Avner-Levi yitzchak’ Day School is grateful to Lev and Olga Leviev for their generous sponsorship of the school, and to the Victor Pinchuk Foundation for donating colorful backpacks to first-graders, each of them complete with a full set of school supplies.