We love stories like this. As we kick off our annual 30-hour giving campaign asking for your support, this note reminds us why we fight so hard to #secureourschools:
“We have been lucky enough to provide the presence of a full-time security guard to stand by the doors and scrutinize all who enter the building. The security guard is there to canvas the campus and protect our toddlers, early childhood, and all of our students through middle school.
“But the costs were prohibitive, and we could no longer afford a security presence for the full school day. We knew that it was important, but we just were not able to crunch the numbers and fit it in our annual budget.
“But then Pittsburgh occurred. 11 of our brothers and sisters were killed in an Anti-Semitic attack. Our community was on high alert and we needed to find a way to provide comfort, protection, and security for our faculty and students. There was no question that we immediately needed to increase the guard’s hours even though we didn’t know how we were going to afford it.
“Through the tireless effort and advocacy of Teach NJ, Governor Murphy quickly signed into law a security bill that doubled our security allocation. This bill was timely, and as a result we were able to have a, trained security professional in the building through the entire day without a major impact anywhere else.”
Tova Renna, President, Rabbi Pesach Raymon Yeshiva