Students from Congregation Beth El’s Jewish Learning Center cut down Phragmites australis in the Meadowlands Conservation Area to be used as roof material for the synagogue’s sukka.
Photo by Natasha Cooper-Benisty
October 9, 2008
Phrags here, phrags there? Fifth- and sixth-graders from the Congregation Beth El Jewish Learning Center spent Oct. 5 far from their classrooms, tramping through the marshes of the Meadowlands and cutting down the invasive species of reeds known as phragmites. They carted off their harvest to use as roofing material for the South Orange synagogue’s sukka.
The next day, fifth-graders from Solomon Schechter Day School of Essex and Union did the very same thing, culling “phrags” for the SSDS lower school sukka.
It all started when JLC teacher, South Orange resident, and Schechter parent Natasha Cooper-Benisty read an article in New Jersey Jewish News last year (“Biologist endorses sukka-builders’ wetlands harvest,” Sept. 20, 2007).
In the article, scientist Michael Weinstein explained why hasidic Jews from Rockland County were traveling to the Meadowlands Conservation Area to cut down Phragmites australis for their sukkot. Weinstein welcomed their efforts: Brought in during the 1800s, the plant isn’t great for the ecosystem.
Carrie Daniella Shapiro, a fifth-grader from the Solomon Schechter Day School of Essex and Union, harvests “phrag” for her school’s sukka in the Meadowlands on Oct. 6.
Photo courtesy SSDS
Cooper-Benisty contacted Weinstein, professor of coastal ecology at Rutgers University’s Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences and chief executive officer of the NJ Marine Sciences Consortium. He suggested getting the schools involved and providing some environmental education along the way. All Cooper-Benisty had to do was wait one year, which she did.
“It was a little off the beaten path,” she said this week, after tromping through the wetlands with 12 kids, some siblings, and a few parents. “People really got into it. I like tying Sukkot to the local environment. It’s more meaningful to get your own schach,” material for the sukka roof. “Now, when the kids walk into the sukka, they can say, ‘I helped get this.’”
The roof of a sukka — erected for the eight days of Sukkot, which begins this year at sundown on Oct. 13 — must be made of organic material; it’s typically made from woven bamboo, corn stalks, or branches trimmed from trees.
Meanwhile, at SSDS of Essex and Union in West Orange, programming coordinator Gena Rosenberg was tipped off by a note from Cooper-Benisty.
The excursion fit into her school’s effort of “pushing ecology into the programming more and more each year,” said Rosenberg. “And we’re always looking for something a little different to do with our students.”
They took the entire fifth grade.
“We had a great time, and we learned about the importance of harvesting and clearing the area of phragmites and found out how we could use the plants for Sukkot,” she said.
--TOP--
Comment: comments@njjewishnews.com
