In a Class of Their Own

TEAM EFFORT Rabbi Mashinsky: “You have students who are lacking basic skills due to mental or physical or learning challenges students who possess basic skills but lack motivation and then you have gifted children who are under-stimulated in the classroom

R abbi Binyamin Barnett was sitting in a far corner of the auditorium nearly invisible as he watched the graduation proceedings. There was Meir Bernstein accepting his diploma from the menahel. Meir paused near the edge of the stage looking out to where his proud parents and grandparents were seated and he smiled clutching the diploma like a trophy. Then his gaze went to the back rows to the slight young man in the dark suit.

Their eyes locked. Meir nodded slowly and offered a little salute toward Rabbi Barnett. Then he squared his shoulders and walked down the stairs to join his fellow graduates.

There were no witnesses to the heroic work they’d done no classmates or rebbeim to see the patience determination and creativity that defined their encounters. Meir’s parents barely knew the man’s name — they just called him the private rebbi or the tutor and grumbled that he took more money per hour than an electrician.