By Joel Magalnick, Editor, JTNews
Seattle Jewish Community Day School has plenty to celebrate. On top of surpassing the 100-student mark this year for the first time, they have been looking into expanding their physical presence and setting the course for the school’s future.
As a result, they decided to title their annual gala dinner and fundraiser “Coming Into Focus.” Organizers Deborah Frockt and Jodi Flynn have spent several months working on putting together the event, to be held March 2 at Seattle’s Town Hall. Their efforts have ranged from obtaining the services of former Painted Table chef Emily Moore to creating a video that will be shown at the party.
The evening, in addition to the video, will honor the past board presidents. A fundraising balloon auction, instead of offering material goods, will be limited to community-building items and fun services instead. A parsha and poker night with Rabbi Jonathan Singer and class projects are among the highlights. The Merl Sanders Trio will be entertaining with swing dance music.
The video has taken the most time and planning, but both Frockt and Flynn have said the work was worth it. The idea came from the school’s development chair Deborah Klein, who said that nobody had ever created a history of the school. As a result, nearly all of the past board presidents sat in the same room together for the first time.
“We wanted to get it down somewhere how everyone seems to think how wonderful the school is,” said Flynn
Frockt, a playwrite, and Flynn, a television producer, did all of the work in creating the video, from writing and interviewing the stars of the video – students, families, and past administrators in SJCS’12-year history.
“We are it,” Frockt said. “It’s definitely all us.”
Screaming Flea Productions, the company where Flynn works, donated all of the equipment and editing services. As of last week, they were putting on the finishing touches.
Both Frockt and Flynn took charge of the planning of the event because of their connection to the school — both have children in the first-grade.
SJCS provides Kindergarten-5th graders a combination of Jewish and secular education. For half the day, students will learn reading, math, science, and other basic courses, while they spend the other half of the day learning Jewish studies such as holidays, history, and Jewish values.
While the school does not identify with any specific Jewish denomination, it calls itself Seattle’s only egalitarian Jewish School. Students live all around the city, but school-board member Deirdre Glynn Levin says roughly 60 percent of the families live in the Northend.
Tickets for the event are still available by calling SJCS at 206-522-5212.
In Bellevue, meanwhile, the Jewish Day School’s big event will occur on March 16. Instead of honoring a group of individuals who have been integral to the workings of the school, this dinner will honor two: Jacquie and Bjorn Bayley.
The Bayleys, whose last child graduated from the school last year, have done a vast amount of fundraising, volunteering, and outreach for JDS. Jacquie Bayley has served on the JDS Board of Trustees, on the school’s Education Committee, and the Judaics/Ritual Practices Committee, among other committees.
Bjorn Bayley, who is co-owner of the Seattle IKEA, has donated time and funds to many organizations around the area, both Jewish and non-Jewish.
This year’s theme is “Build a Ladder to the Stars,” which is meant to reflect how the children at JDS build a ladder based upon academic excellence, community, and tradition that they can carry with them for their entire lives.
The event, which will be held at the Sheraton Towers in downtown Seattle, will also have both silent and live auctions. Some of the items going up for auction include a tugboat dinner party, an opportunity to be a Seattle Sonics ball boy or girl for a day.
Several JDS students will likely make their parents bid high on the opportunity to be Head of School for a day in an effort to oust current head of school Rabbi Elon Sunshine and throw ice cream parties all day long. This event will be Rabbi Sunshine’s first.
More than 100 volunteers have been working to put the dinner and event together, and enthusiasm is running high.
“We expect a big turnout not only from the Jewish community but from the broader community,” says JDS development director Amy Shafron. Because of the Bayleys’ involvement in the entire community, including children’s theatre and with the city of Renton, Shafron says this dinner could be their biggest ever.
Jewish Day School runs from preschool–8th grade, and works to foster lifelong connections to the Jewish community. The school integrates community service and field trips into its curriculum, and emphasizes its use of technology in the classroom in every grade.
Tickets for the event can be obtained from Development Director Amy Shafron at Jewish Day School at 425-460-0229 or [email protected]