My Time at DJDS - Kiki Rosenthal (Class of 2022)

 

By Kiki Rosenthal, DJDS Senior (Class of 2022)

 

My name is Naomi (Kiki) Rosenthal, and I am a senior here at Denver Jewish Day School. I am beyond proud to call myself a K-12 DJDS graduate and I am excited to begin my next chapter at Dartmouth University this fall. I’m excited about my new classes at Dartmouth. I was initially scared to go to school with my older brother Jonas (Class of 2021), but now I’m really looking forward to reuniting with him. I think Dartmouth has a terrific balance of academic rigor and summer-camp relaxation vibes.

 

I can distinctly remember being admitted to DJDS even as a young student, and I just remember thinking how meaningful it was to me at the time because I knew it was the school where I wanted to be. Even from a young age, I wanted to fully utilize everything that DJDS had to offer academically. In 8th grade, I started realizing the classes that I enjoyed and areas that I wanted to pursue further, so I took full advantage of that opportunity. Each year that went by at DJDS, I took a wide variety of classes that helped expand my academic horizons. In addition to my classes, the emphasis on Jewish education and Jewish identity has also left a really strong impression on me. Going to Israel, taking Jewish classes, and having DJDS be part of the greater Jewish community has demonstrated what a supporting and thriving Jewish community is and means to me. Taking it even a step further, I feel that going to a smaller school with smaller class sizes has taught me how to be open-minded to other people’s opinions and how to incorporate them into my own beliefs and how to approach teachers outside of classtime comfortably.

 

When I was in 7th grade, I remember one time I was going to Friday morning Minyan and I had started wearing tefillin to practice for my Bat Mitzvah. Mr. Halper gave me a book that described the symbolism behind tefillin and I had really never read it. We hardly even spoke that much at that time, but the act of him giving me that book stood out to me in the sense of people in this school community always look out for each other.

 

When I was in 6th and 7th grade, I participated in the science fair and I got to work with Mrs. Knowles who at the time was not my teacher and I was very excited. I was doing this experiment involving curly candle wicks and testing the effectiveness of burns, and I would go into her classroom and work on the candles. Sometimes, this took place during a high school chemistry class with the sophomores and I would ask them to hold the wicks for me while they would dry. Interacting with those sophomores was eye-opening at the time. For me, to see older role models seeming just as confused as I was in Mrs. Knowles' class and seeing how comfortable they were with me, made me realize that this school and community were special. That teachers that I didn’t know were approachable and that older student could absolutely be my friends.

 

I would say this school has become my home away from home. My kindergarten teachers remembered me when I was a high schooler. I know this campus, and I know the people, I know the teachers, and I have always felt this sense of comfort throughout my time here. I’m never going to be afraid or embarrassed to try new things because of DJDS. This school taught me to believe in myself and not to shy away from fighting for what I believe in.