Local News
Beloved former Gray Academy teacher Sharon Freed honoured by appreciative former students
By MYRON LOVE Nicole Freed was inspired to become a teacher by her mother’s example. “I remember the moment I decided to become a teacher,” the daughter of the late Sharon Freed, who passed away suddenly in December 2019, told a gathering of some of her mother’s former colleagues and students. The event, which was held to share memories of Sharon Freed took place in the Kaufman-Silverberg Library at the Asper Campus on Thursday, March 26.
As Nicole Freed recounted, “I was sitting at the kitchen table. Mom was helping me with my homework when she suddenly got up to call a parent. I remember my mom asking if a particular student was okay because she had missed two days of school. After she hung up, I asked her while she called. I suggested that the student was probably just sick. My mother’s response was that she cared about all of her students and wanted to make sure the girl was alright. That moment stayed with me. I wanted to be a teacher – like my mom – who cared about all of her students.”
Sharon Freed hold the record for the longest serving teacher in our Jewish school system. When she retired in 2015, she had taught continuously for 47 years, starting at the former I.L. Peretz School, then moving on to Joseph Wolinsky Collegiate, and finishing her career at Gray Academy. Over that time, she inspired two generations of students. Among them were former students Josh and Samantha Morry and their father, Howard. (Their mother, Hope, grew up in the south end.) In appreciation, the Morry Family has established the Sharon Freed Collection at the Kaufman-Silverberg Library in their former teacher’s memory.
Books and words were very important to Freed, recalled Kaufman-Silverberg head librarian Ana Esterin. “Sharon liked multigenerational novels, historical fiction, romance, and Russian novels, Esterin noted.. “She would frequently come in and ask what well-written new novels were in.”
Freed’s choice of literature is reflected in the new Sharon Freed Collection at the library The collection – behind glass doors in a bookshelf in the library’s foyer sits across from a giant mural with Freed’s visage in the centre of it and a table with a scrabble board with the former teacher’s name spelled out. (Scrabble was another of her passions.)
In formally introducing the Sharon Freed Collection, Lori Binder, Gray Academy’s Head of School and CEO of the Winnipeg Board of Jewish Education, welcomed Freed’s family members, friends and former colleagues and students in attendance either in person or via Zoom. Binder (who is also a former student of the beloved teacher) said the tribute to Freed was “a deeply moving afternoon filled with laughter, tears, and the tradition of storytelling that Mrs. Freed cherished so dearly.
“As we continue to reflect on Sharon’s impact, we are reminded of the words of Rabbi Sacks (z”l), who said that to be a Jew is to know that those who came before us live on in us. Yesterday was a testament to the truth of those words. Sharon lives on in the books we have curated in her honour, the students she mentored, the friends and family she loved, the colleagues she confided in, and the community she helped build.
Thank you for helping us ensure that Sharon’s story continues to be told. That is the thing we can all hope for, that when someone passes, they are remembered through stories.”
Speaking from Israel via Zoom, Freed’s older daughter, Andrea, remembered her mother as “a very special person. It seems that everywhere I go, I run into former students of my mother who want to share with me fond memories of her.”
Nicole added that “it is evident from today’s wonderful event that my mom truly did care about all her students and had special relationships with them. I realize now more than ever what a lasting impact a teacher can make.”
She also thanked Binder and Skye Kneller (Gray Academy’s Director of Advancement and Alumni Relations) for including Freed’s two daughters in the planning of the event. “It meant a lot that you both wanted to make sure that our opinions and thoughts were heard,” she noted.
Marilyn Beloff, Freed’s younger sister, flew in from Vancouver for the inauguration. “It’s clear to me why I’m here,” she said. “I’m here because of this deep love and respect for my sister and how much she’s taught me and lives within me each day.”
“The best way to honour her is to speak about her and keep her in your mind’s eye whenever you can…this wonderful collection will live on.”
Former colleague Lawrence Goldstine spoke about his service with Freed on the Jewish school teacher’s union leadership team. “Sharon was dedicated to fighting for the benefit of Gray Academy’s teachers,” he noted. “I considered her a mentor to me in that regard.”
Former student Ben Waldman credited Freed with how she inspired him to pursue a career in journalism. “Within this school, there’s a tradition of storytelling that begins the moment we enter,” noted the Winnipeg Free Press reporter. We become a part of the Winnipeg Jewish community in such a meaningful way, and I don’t think I fully understood how much Mrs. Freed had to do with that until after I graduated.
“As a teenager, I, like many other young people, was still trying to figure myself out,” he continued. “We were malleable and Mrs. Freed was very much a fixed entity. She knew who she was. And when you came into her room, she knew that she could help shape you, even if you weren’t ready to be shaped.
“I couldn’t think of a better way to remember her than with this gift of a collection in her memory… A celebration for Mrs. Freed is a celebration for this institution that we really do care about and love. I’m happy that a new generation of kids who may not have had the chance to be in her class will now at least know her name.”
Speaking on Zoom on behalf of the Morry family, Josh Morry said that “we had been talking for a long time about doing something to honour her memory. I’m so happy. This collection is so perfectly themed for what she loved, which is books and imparting that to other people. I do hope that her memory will live on. I am sure it does through all of us.”
Morry also spoke of wanting to create a “Mrs. Freed commemorative Scrabble tournament.” “I remember we used to come to her classroom and we would play Scrabble at lunch,” he recalled. “We would talk about the Queen, and we would try to impress her with the way in which we read when she called on us.
“I think as a lawyer, I use a lot of the writing skills that she taught us.”
Lori Binder concluded the presentation with a “very special thank you” to the Morry family, who joined the launch virtually. “Their generous gift made this collection and this launch possible,” she said.
She also thanked the Jewish Foundation of Manitoba for their ongoing and vital support of the library.
Librarian Ana Esterin reports that the initial Sharon Freed Collection includes 13 books. The library is encouraging individuals to consider a donation to the library to add to the collection.
Local News
Gray Academy to Represent Manitoba at National Reach for the Top Competition
By NOAH STRAUSS Gray Academy’s Reach for the Top team is headed to Moncton, New Brunswick, to represent Manitoba at the National Reach for the Top tournament.
Reach for the Top is a Canadian school league that quizzes teenagers on a variety of different topics, from science and history to pop culture. Reach started out in 1961 in Vancouver, where a local CBC station broadcasted the new show; it eventually became a national broadcast starting in 1966. Alex Trebek, who famously hosted Jeopardy!, started out by hosting Reach for the Top.
Gray Academy’s very own team, made up of Grade 7 and 8 students, will travel to Moncton, New Brunswick, to compete as Team Manitoba. By winning the provincial Reach tournament, they secured their spot in the national competition.
Faculty members at Gray Academy are very supportive of the program. The Jewish Post spoke with three different staff members at the school. Coach and high school teacher Danielle Miller says she is excited for the trip; although she will not be accompanying the team herself, shehas coached them all year.
“This year we had over 20 students come to the club to join us, they practice twice a cycle at lunch,” Miller said. Due to the large turnout this year, two teams had to be formed. At lunch practices, students split into two teams of four where each player has a buzzer. The two teams compete to see who can answer the most questions correctly.
One of the two teams did exceptionally well at various tournaments throughout the year and will be traveling to nationals as the sole team representing Manitoba.
Co-coach Micah Doerksen described Reach as a great academic competition where young minds are tested on various topics through quick,fast-paced questions.
High school guidance counselor Lindsey Leipsic said, “We have athletes, non-athletes, we have students who are really involved and students who are not as involved at school, and we have quiet leaders, and we’ve seen friendships be built in Reach.” Some of her favorite memories of Reach involve seeing students from across Winnipeg come to Gray Academy and bond with one another. Lev Chisick, who is competing at nationals, agreed, saying, “Moncton is going to strengthen our school spirit and make us a better team.”
As the junior team makes their way to Moncton, the senior team will head to provincials. Later this week, students from the senior team will travel to Virden, Manitoba, to compete at the provincial level. The team qualified after placing high enough at their most recent tournament, which took place at St. Paul’s.
Confidence is high as the school heads into these final tournaments. When Nath Goldenberg, who is also competing at nationals, was asked what he is most looking forward to, his answer was short and sweet:“Winning.”
Local News
Team Schvesters teammates Benji Harvey, Kim Gray once again among top ten fundraisers in this year’s CancerCare Manitoba Foundation Challenge for Life event
By MYRON LOVE This year’s annual CancerCare Manitoba Foundation’s Challenge for Life walk at Assiniboine Park is scheduled for Sunday, June 13 – and, once again, in terms of fundraising, Team Schvesters is sitting in second place overall – having raised just over $30,500 as of May 26 – which is $5,000 more than the team members had raised by the same time last year.
As well, team members Benji Harvey and Kim Gray are once again in the top ten among individual fundraisers. Harvey this year sits in fifth place, having raised a little over $16,000 as of May 17 – while Gray has raised just above $8,000 – putting her in seventh place.
Harvey reports that, -over the past 18, years participating in CancerCare Manitoba Foundation’s Challenge for Life, she has personally raised $180,000 for cancer research, while her team as a whole has brought in $367,000. In discussing her success as a fundraiser, Harvey says that she has made a lot of friends over the years and believes in giving back to the community.
The “Schvesters” are the Greenfeld sisters: Harvey and sisters Lesly Katz and Debra Lewis – the daughters of Lil and the late Ike Greenfeld. Two of the sisters are cancer survivors.
There is one other team member – in addition to Kim Gray. Judge Rocky Pollack first joined Team Schvesters in 2023. After a year away in 2024, he returned last year. Pollack lost his wife, Sharon, to cancer in 2014 after a multi-year struggle.
Nancy’s Nightingales has been a top 10 community fundraising team for Cancercare Manitoba and the Challenge for Life since its inception in 2008. As a team, they have walked together since 2006 when they walked 60 km in two days in the Weekend to End Breast Cancer.
Last year, the team – including Louise Raber, Joanne Katz, Rhonda Youell, Connie Botelho and Harriet Lyons – finished fifth in fundraising. So far this year, the team is again sitting in fifth place –having raised just under $12,500 (as of May 26) – a couple of thousand dollars more than last year, and just about $300 behind the fourth place team.
The Nightingales are named after a nurse who is a cancer survivor- and a friend of Louise Raber, Nancy’s Nightingales team leader.
“Our goal, as always, is to raise at least one dollar more than last year,” says Raber.
Team Jason’s Journey team leader Jason Gisser has experienced a more intimate and longer-lasting relationship with cancer than many of the other Challenge for Life participants. He was first diagnosed with cancer when he was 18. “I am a proud cancer fighter, having lived and battled a chronic cancer diagnosis for the last 23 years,” he said in an earlier interview. “I participate in the Challenge for Life not only to give back for the care and treatment which I have and continue to receive through CancerCare Manitoba, but to ensure that others do not have to endure the journey which I have endured.”
This is the ninth year that Gisser has taken up the Challenge for Life. His teammates are returnee Nora Fien, as well as friends Danial Sprintz, Wendy Martin White and Jason Roberts, also his mother, Judge Freda Steele. He has personally raised about $5,500 this year, while the team as a whole has raised just over $7,000.
“The Challenge for Life is great opportunity to raise valuable dollars for cancer research and treatment,” Gisser notes.
Readers can make donations to their preferred team by going online to CancerCarefdn.mb.ca and click on Challengeforlife.ca.
Local News
Government of Manitoba Recognizes Jewish Awareness Month
By MYRON LOVE Over nearly 150 years of Jewish life in Manitoba our community has produced a great many individuals who have enriched the life of our fellow Manitobans and beyond. On Monday, May 11, members of our community gathered in the rotunda at the Legislature to celebrate the province’s designation of May as Jewish Heritage Month.
In her remarks on the occasion, Carrie Shenkarow, Chair of the Jewish Federation of Winnipeg, noted that Manitoba first recognized May as Jewish Heritage Month in 2022 – joining the Federal Government and other Canadian provinces in celebrating the contributions of Jewish communities to our country ‘s history and identity.
“Early Jewish settlers,” she said, “arrived seeking opportunity and a fresh start. Through perseverance, hard work and a deep commitment to community, they helped build the province we know today.”
Shenkarow noted that “our community has contributed to Manitoba in countless ways through business, public service, education, healthcare, the arts, philanthropy and volunteerism.”
Following up on that theme, Belle Jarniewski, the Executive Director of the Jewish Heritage Centre of Western Canada and the Manitoba Institute to Combat Antisemitism, enumerated many of those outstanding Jewish Manitobans, including – in the area of philanthropy, names such as: Asper, Gray, Rady, Blankstein, Niznick, Vickar, and Kanee.
Among the top ranks of outstanding Jewish Winnipeggers were: Sol Kanee – a force in national politics and a leader of world Jewry for half a century; Maitland Steinkopf, the first Jewish provincial cabinet minister (in the 1960s Duff Roblin Government) and the man who built the Centennial Concert Hall; Mr. Justice Samuel Freedman – the first Jewish Chief Justice of Manitoba;. Israel Asper, who not only served as leader of the provincial Liberal Party – but was also the visionary – along with his daughter, Gail – to build the Canadian Museum for Human Rights: Jim Carr, who was both an MLA and leader of the provincial Liberal Party as well as a prominent cabinet minister in the Justin Trudeau Government; Anita Neville, former Federal Liberal member of Parliament and our first Jewish Lieutenant-Governor; and the incomparable Monty Hall – the longtime host of “Let’s Make a Deal” and arguably our community’s best known export.
Jarniewski further listed outstanding doctors and lawyers, author and artists, musicians, composers, artistic directors, actors and performers whom our Jewish community has produced over the decades.
Carrie Shenkarow noted that the story of Jewish life in Manitoba has always been one of renewal and growth. “When our community faced population decline late in the 20th century, community leaders took action,” she recalled. “The opening of the Asper Jewish Community campus in 1997 and the launch of the GrowWinnipeg initiative helped revitalize Jewish life in our province.
“Working in partnership with the Provence of Manitoba,” she continued, “our community welcomed Jewish families from around the world. Since the GrowWinnipeg launch, more than 6,000 people have made Winnipeg their home, strengthening both our Jewish community and Manitoba as a whole.
“As we reflect on the first Jewish settlers who arrived here generations ago,” she commented, “I believe they would be proud to see the vibrant thriving community that exists today and to see Jewish Heritage Month recognized here at the Manitoba Legislative Building.”
Even amidst the warm feelings expressed by all the speakers at the event – including Gustavo Zentner, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs’ vice president, Manitoba and Saskatchewan; Liberal member of Parliament Ben Carr (Winnipeg South Centre); NDP MLAs Mike Moroz (River Heights) and Carla Compton (Tuxedo) – who served as emcee – both Shenkarow and Jarniewski raised the troubling concerns about an upsurge in antisemitism that we have been facing in recent years.
“All is not well for Jewish Manitobans today” Jarniewski observed. “We worry about the safety of our children and grandchildren.”
She reported that Jewish Canadians are 25 times more likely to experience a hate crime than any other group. “We have witnessed protests that include Holocaust inversion and even outright threats,” Jarniewski said. “We have been victims of harassment, demonization and hate crimes. Jewish children in public schools have suffered emotional and physical violence and are blamed for a war happening half a world away. Security has become an important and even overriding issue at all our community institutions.”
On the other hand, Shenkarow commented, recent events have “galvanized Jewish communities around the world and strengthened our connection to Jewish identity, community and peoplehood.”
She also spoke of the “tremendous solidarity here in Manitoba from friends, neighbours, elected officials and community partners who have stood with us and reaffirmed our shared values of respect, inclusion and dignity.”
Final remarks were delivered by MLA Mike Moroz: “Jewish heritage is not merely an amalgamation of celebrations,” he observed, “but a testament of difficulties, conflict, and ultimately, the truth. And the truth is that antisemitism is not a historical tale of the past. It still rears its ugliness today, through stereotypes, online hate, acts of vandalism and violence. The truth is also that antisemitism evolves, adapts, and even at times may disguise itself in language that may be difficult to immediately recognize. This is where our collective action towards creating awareness and education matters.
“Any group of people targeted because of their identity or ethnicity is an affront to the core values of respect, equality, diversity, and dignity that so many Manitobans cherish,” he continued.
Moroz added that “here in Manitoba, we have a collective responsibility to confront all forms of hate or discrimination for any targeted group. Awareness not only includes education but also understanding and challenging the many forms of antisemitism. It requires us to collectively confront misinformation, speak up when we are faced with harmful language and together – stand against indifference. It is important to know that while silence may allow prejudice to grow, creating awareness will disrupt it.
“Jewish Heritage Month,” he concluded, “invites us to engage more deeply in the values that continue to advance humanity for the common good. To understand traditions and values that positively impact on our communities. To collectively honour the past, while shaping a better future for us and leaving a proud legacy for those who come after us”.
“As we mark Jewish Heritage Month, I hope that each of us will not only commit to commemoration but to action as well. Together, we can celebrate accomplishments, confront hate with truth, and strengthen our resolve to build a Manitoba where everyone feels safe, valued, and welcomed.”