Another new school year begins in Monsey, infused with hopes and impassioned tefillos of parents and teachers. As thousands of eager and excited students fill its over sixty Chinuch institutions, the Monsey community celebrates a monumental turning point for schools, educators, and the broader Chinuch landscape. This June, Torah Umesorah celebrated the soft opening of a local Teacher Center in Monsey, NY. This marks the organization’s initiation of its eighth Teacher Center with locations worldwide, in Brooklyn, Lakewood, Chicago, LA, Toronto, Montreal, and Manchester, UK.   The Monsey Teacher Center, located at Chestnut Ridge Road and Old Nyack Turnpike, has been in the works for quite some time. Until its inauguration, Monsey mechanchim and mechanchos had to make the trip to Brooklyn or Lakewood for quality Teacher Center materials and services, so the new Center is a welcome and long-awaited milestone in Monsey’s chinuch world.  Torah Umesorah’s Teacher Centers are built on the belief that every teacher deserves the opportunity to excel. Teaching is not just an occupation, but a noble craft that requires learning, honing, and consistent refinement of skills. The Centers offer expert coaching, curricula development, resource design, and professional development. But a Torah Umesorah Teacher Center is so much more than a list of services.  An educator visiting a TU Teacher Center is availed of priceless opportunities. Teachers can attend seminars, speak with educational specialists, and learn more about the social-emotional needs of their students. Methodology can simultaneously be organized and broadened while gaining insight about delivering a topic with clarity, finding tried-and-true ways to assess student progress, and exploring how to cultivate with geshmak, warmth, and a genuine love of learning in the classroom. Students of every age level and demographic benefit daily from Torah Umesorah’s Teacher Centers, and their parents experience significant benefits as a result.  The timing of the Monsey Center’s soft opening could not have been more perfect. It kicked off a splendid summer and back-to-school season – a resounding confirmation of how necessary and long-awaited an initiative it is. Without even a single advertisement, the Center attracted and serviced close to eighty teachers and principals within its first month of opening!  The majority of visitors to the Center were Monsey residents, but a variety of summer vacationers from Arizona to Connecticut stopped in to stock up on quality materials to bring home to their classrooms. Another unique category of visitors who enjoyed the Center this August was seminaries offering special education courses.  In addition to a selection of courses, materials, and curricula to explore, the Center hosted a groundbreaking training series for new rebbeim under the leadership of Rabbi Moshe Serebrowski. Over a dozen mechanchim attended the dynamic shiurim given by R’ Avrohom Leiner, star rebbi at Cheder D’Monsey, gaining vital skills for setting up a classroom and maintaining proper procedures and communications.  Phase Two of the Center’s expansion focuses on professional development for educators of all subject areas and grade levels. A rich variety of workshops to help teachers develop their skills both academically and socially-emotionally will be premiering throughout the winter months. The Monsey Teacher Center was originally envisioned by Mr. and Mrs. Yehuda Wagner. However, it was Mr. Benzion Heitner’s announcement at the TU Presidents Conference in 2019 that began to turn this project into a reality. Despite several hurdles, […]