By Joel Magalnick, JTNews Correspondent
When students at the Jewish Day School of Metropolitan Seattle showed up for their first day of classes a couple weeks ago, the smiling face from behind the desk of head-of-school was a new — but familiar — one. John Zito, former assistant head-of-school and four-year veteran of JDS, officially took over the post this summer.
“We love him,” says Florence Katz Burstein, president of the school board and parent of one of the school’s eighth graders. “He’s great with kids, with faculty, with families, we’re really happy to have him in that spot.”
Though the kids all had the summer off, Zito said he has been busy. He has had to hire some staff, and fiscal concerns made him decide to not replace the assistant head-of-school position.
“It’s a tougher time in schools right now, we needed to be careful,” Zito said.
The position’s responsibilities have been divided among the staff, a move Zito said was done because he felt the administration could handle the extra load.
Though Zito officially started in June, he has not yet worked with the board to decide any new directions for the school.
“I told the board, let me work through the summer,” he said, “and then we’ll sit down and share both of our visions and our goals together.”
He already has challenges to face.
Among the toughest: a decline in students. Day schools around the country have seen a drop in students due to the tough economy, and JDS is no exception.
Burstein noted that some non-Jewish private schools have underwritten public radio programming and announced they had openings in specific classes. “I’d never heard that before,” she said.
“Increasing enrollment is a definite goal of mine,” Zito said. “We are not getting new families moving to Seattle anymore.”
He said that the school has only three or four new families, which is dramatically different from the years before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. He will not sit and watch the numbers drop, however.
“I want to be very, very active with helping market the school,” he said. “We have to come up with innovative ways to attract children.”
Zito also made some changes to kick off the school year.
The most noticeable was in the middle school: each student now receives a new laptop computer.
In the past, parents would pay for their children’s laptops, and once the student graduated he or she would own the computer. By the time graduation came around, however, the equipment was often obsolete.
“Technology changes so dramatically, that the laptop the kid purchased four years before,” Zito said, “was not what you needed to leave with.”
Beginning this year, JDS leased all of the computers from the Dell Corp. Zito said he spent the summer making sure all of the software and textbooks, including Hebrew language, were ready for the first day of school
“To do that in six weeks was in incredibly monumental task,” Zito said.
He is also looking at the younger children’s programs.
“Preschool is one my primary areas to really look at,” he said.
The preschool began a year ago, when the Stroum Jewish Community Center, which had had its satellite preschool located on-site, announced it was shutting that program down. JDS jumped in, received accreditation, and opened up its own school for the 2002-2003 year. The board decided to continue running the preschool into current school year, Zito said.
“It’s good for the Eastside that there is a preschool there,” he added.
Zito said he must also continue working on updating the school’s curriculum, in both Hebrew and secular studies, to keep up with what’s happening, so the kids don’t fall behind. With an intense dual curriculum, the students have their work cut out for them.
“When you come to a day school you really commit yourself,” he said.
Zito must also begin preparing the area community for a capital campaign. JDS would like to rebuild its school on the current site in the next few years, Burstein said.
According to Zito, continued upgrades and vigilance in school security, an area which he gave heavy focus while assistant head-of-school, will also require constant attention.
Though this is only Zito’s fourth year with JDS, he has more than 30 years of experience in education, which began in New York and has taken him as far away as India and Kenya. When he came to Seattle five years ago — he says he loves the richness of the natural beauty in the area — he and his wife worked together at Seattle Hebrew Academy. He had never previously worked in Jewish education before.
Zito took the head-of-school position over from the outgoing head-of-school, Rabbi Elan Sunshine. Sunshine had been with JDS for a year, and the board did not renew his contract.
“It was recognition on both sides, and so we parted company amicably and we moved on,” Burstein said.
One difference between Rabbi Sunshine and Zito is that Sunshine is Jewish. Zito said that was what kept him from applying for the head-of-school job two years ago.
“I probably made it a personal liability, and it really wasn’t,” he says, but now “I don’t feel that way at all.”
He said the board has embraced his abilities, and he can have the Jewish curriculum coordinator, Rabbi Stuart Light, address any religious issues that may arise.
Ultimately, he said, what must happen is that the school is designed with the children in mind.
“We need to provide those kinds of opportunities [so] kids will smile when they’re here,” he said. “We really need to have fun.”