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"The Basketball Game" is a graphic novel adaptation of the award-winning National Film Board of Canada animated short of the same name – intended for audiences aged 12 years and up. It's a poignant tale of the power of community as a means to rise above hatred and bigotry. In the end, as is recognized by the kids playing the basketball game, we're all in this together.

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Tag: Simie Schtroks

Looking for nominees … the nominated and the winners

The Centre for Judaism of the Lower Fraser Valley is looking for nominations for its annual Lamplighter Award, which honours a young person who has performed an outstanding act of community service.

Candidates must be between the ages of 6 and 18 and submission of potential recipients must include two references describing the child’s community service. The chosen lamplighter will receive the award during Chanukah at an evening ceremony at Semiahmoo Shopping Centre.

“Chanukah celebrates the victory of light over darkness and goodness over evil,” said Simie Schtroks. “This is a most appropriate opportunity to motivate and inspire young people to make this world a brighter and better place. By filling the world with goodness and kindness, that light can dispel all sorts of darkness.”

To nominate a candidate for the award, contact Schtroks as soon as possible at [email protected].

* * *

This summer, David Granirer received a Meritorious Service Medal from the Governor General of Canada. The award recognizes a deed or activity that has been performed in a highly professional manner, or according to a very high standard: often innovative, this deed or activity sets an example for others to follow, improves the quality of life of a community and brings benefit or honour to Canada.

Granirer is a counselor, stand-up comic and mental health keynote speaker. Granirer, who himself has depression, has taught stand-up comedy to recovering addicts and cancer patients, and founded Stand Up for Mental Health, a program teaching comedy to people with mental health issues, in 2004. He has trained Stand Up for Mental Health groups in partnership with various mental health organizations in more than 50 cities in Canada, the United States and Australia. His work on mental health is featured by media worldwide and has garnered several awards.

Granirer also teaches Stand-Up Comedy Clinic at Langara College, and many of his students have gone on to become professional comics.

* * *

This year’s Mayor’s Arts Award for Community Engaged Arts went to Earle Peach. A singer, songwriter, composer, conductor, arranger, teacher and performer, Peach leads four choirs in the city and hosts a monthly community coffee house in Mount Pleasant. He teaches privately, and records musicians for demos and albums. He performs with Barbara Jackson as a duo called Songtree and also has a band called Illiteratty.

The emerging artist honour went to Ariel Martz-Oberlander, a theatre artist, writer and teacher. As a Jewish settler on Coast Salish territories with diasporic and refugee ancestry, her practice is rooted in a commitment to place-based accountability through decolonizing and solidarity work. She divides her time between theatre and community organizing, and specializing in creative protest tactics on land and water.

Martz-Oberlander is a facilitator with the True Voice Theatre Project, producing new shows by residents of the Downtown Eastside and vulnerably housed youth, in collaboration with the Gathering Place and Covenant House. Her most recent work, created with support from the LEAP program, won a research and development prize from the Arts Club. Martz-Oberlander is also the associate producer for Vines Festival, presenting accessible, free eco-art in Vancouver parks. Good art is accountable to the community, raises up voices rarely heard and is vital to repairing our world.

* * *

On Oct. 3, the Koffler Centre of the Arts announced the four winners of the 2017 Vine Awards for Canadian Jewish Literature, all of whom were on hand at the award luncheon at the Park Hyatt Hotel in Toronto.

Winners in two of the categories are based in Vancouver. Miriam Libicki won the non-fiction award for Toward a Hot Jew (Fantagraphics Books Inc.), which the jury described as, “An admirably complicated response to being a woman and a Jew in our time, a thrilling combination of memoir, journalism and art.” And Irene N. Watts and Kathryn E. Shoemaker took the prize in the children’s/young adult category for Seeking Refuge (Tradewind Books), which the jury described as, “A superb graphic novel dramatizing the Kindertransport, a powerful story enhanced by firsthand experience and beautiful black-and-white illustrations.”

The other winners were Peter Behrens’ Carry Me (House of Anansi Press) for fiction and Matti Friedman’s Pumpkinflowers (McClelland & Stewart) for history.

The history shortlist included Max Eisen’s By Chance Alone (Harper Collins Publishers) and Ester Reiter’s A Future Without Hate or Need: The Promise of the Jewish Left in Canada (Between the Lines). Runners-up in the fiction category were Eric Beck Rubin’s School of Velocity (Doubleday Canada) and Danila Botha’s For All the Men (and Some of the Women) I’ve Known (Tightrope Books). In non-fiction, Sarah Barmak’s Closer: Notes from the Orgasmic Frontier of Female Sexuality (Coach House Books), Judy Batalion’s White Walls (Berkley/Penguin Random House) and David Leach’s Chasing Utopia (ECW Press) were runners-up, while Deborah Kerbel’s Feathered (Kids Can Press) and Tilar Mazzeo and Mary Farrell’s Irena’s Children (Margaret K. McElderry Books) were on the children’s/young adult short list.

* * *

In September 2017, local community member Dr. Arthur Wolak was elected for a three-year term to the board of governors of Gratz College, a private liberal arts college in suburban Philadelphia. Founded in 1895, Gratz is the oldest independent and pluralistic college for Jewish studies in North America. Accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, Gratz is also recognized by Israel’s Ministry of Education and Culture. Through its undergraduate and graduate programs, Gratz educates students to become effective educators, administrators and community leaders.

Posted on October 27, 2017October 25, 2017Author Community members/organizationsCategories LocalTags activism, Ariel Martz-Oberlander, Arthur Wolak, books, Centre for Judaism, David Granirer, Earle Peach, Gratz College, Irene Watts, Kathryn Shoemaker, Lamplighter Award, Mayor’s Arts Award, mental health, Meritorious Service, Miriam Libicki, Simie Schtroks, tikkun olam, Vine Awards
Nominate a young light

Nominate a young light

Yosef Nider, centre, receives the inaugural Lamplighter Award last year. (photo from Centre for Judaism)

Do you, or does someone you know, qualify for the Centre for Judaism Young Lamplighter Award? Has anyone you know between the ages of 5 and 18 made a unique effort to illuminate their world by performing extra special deeds of goodness and kindness?

Last Chanukah, on Dec. 21, Yosef Nider, 7, received the Centre for Judaism Young Lamplighter Award at the annual public menorah lighting in the Semiahmoo Shopping Centre. White Rock Mayor Wayne Baldwin, Surrey Mayor Linda Hepner and Rabbi Falik and Rebbetzin Simie Schtroks, co-directors of the Centre for Judaism of the Fraser Valley, presented Yosef with an engraved trophy, as well as a cash prize.

“Chanukah celebrates the victory of light over darkness and goodness over evil. This is a most appropriate opportunity to motivate and inspire young people … with a little light, they can dispel all sorts of darkness,” said Simie Schtroks.

“We were delighted to bestow this honor upon young Yosef because he turned the painful experience of dealing with his grandfather’s terminal cancer into an opportunity to do good for others. With his parents’ support, he organized an event – highlighted by his own violin performance – A Concert for a Cure, which raised $10,000 for cancer research,” she added.

Jeff Nider, Yosef’s father, described the experience. “We were blown away by the events of the evening, and it was such an honor for my wife and I to be the parents of a child who won the Lamplighter Award,” he said. “Yosef started out simply wanting to do something to help his grandfather, but what he eventually accomplished resulted in such a ripple effect. We truly are amazed and feel both humbled and proud of Yosef.”

When Yosef heard that he would be passing the light forward to the next recipient, he said, “I felt really happy to get this award. I hope that other kids will also do something good for the world after hearing about this award. The award is on my dresser in my room. I also got to buy a really cool Lego set.”

The deadline to submit a nominee for this year’s Lamplighter Award is Nov. 22, 2015. Include with the nomination at least one letter of recommendation written by a rabbi, teacher, principal, mentor, doctor or other verifiable source. Send all the material and direct any questions to Simie Schtroks, [email protected].

The award ceremony takes place on Dec. 13, 5:30 p.m., at the Semiahmoo Mall menorah lighting. Everyone is welcome.

Format ImagePosted on October 30, 2015October 28, 2015Author Centre for JudaismCategories LocalTags Lamplighter Award, Simie Schtroks, tikkun olam, Yosef Nider
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