| Torah Academy of Bergen County | |
|---|---|
| Established | 1982 |
| Type | Private High School, all-male Yeshiva |
| Affiliation | Modern Orthodox Judaism |
| Faculty | 24.3 (on FTE basis)[1] |
| Students | 246 (as of 2009-10)[1] |
| Grades | 9–12 |
| Location | Teaneck, NJ, |
| Accreditation | Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools |
| Colors | Royal Blue and Gold |
| Newspaper | 'Eye of the Storm, Storm Watch, Kol Torah |
| Website | www.tabc.org |
Torah Academy of Bergen County is a four-year yeshiva high school located in Teaneck, in Bergen County, New Jersey. It utilizes a split-schedule day offering both Jewish studies and college preparatory courses. The school has been accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Secondary Schools since 2005.[2]
TABC, as it is commonly known, is run by the Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Yosef Adler (who is also the Rabbi of Congregation Rinat Yisrael in Teaneck, NJ), and the Principal of General Studies, Arthur Poleyeff. Also in the administration is Rabbi Ezra Wiener, the Mashgiach Ruchani (Religious Life Guidance Counselor).
As of the 2009-10 school year, the school had an enrollment of 246 students and 24.3 classroom teachers (on an FTE basis), for a student–teacher ratio of 10.1.[1]
In 2005, the school was accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools.[3] Some of the undergraduate colleges that TABC students have been accepted to include Boston College, Brandeis University, Columbia University, Cooper Union, Cornell University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Maryland, College Park, New York University, Princeton University, Queens College, Rutgers University, University of Pennsylvania and Yeshiva University.
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The Advanced Placement (AP) courses offered are: AP Chemistry, AP Physics B, AP Physics C, AP Calculus AB and BC, AP Computers A and AB, AP United States History, AP English Literature and Composition, AP English Language and Composition, CL Jewish History, AP Psychology, AP Biology, and AP Statistics. Most of these are only primarily offered to juniors and seniors.
Each year more than 91% of the Senior class decides to study for a year or two in Yeshiva in Israel before beginning college.
The school is additionally noted for its intense culinary arts seniors elective for, thought to be the first of its type for a mainstream boys yeshiva high school. [4]
The school hosts a program of the SINAI Special Needs Institute, an organization dedicated to serving both the educational, psychological and emotional needs of Jewish children and young adults. The program serves children of below to above average intelligence with different degrees of learning disability and a wide variety of behavioral characteristics, whose needs could not be addressed by traditional Jewish day school programs and curricula.
The school has a number of extracurricular activities, some that do well even on the international level. The school's Mock trial team was the 2005 New Jersey State Champions and received a lot of press coverage both in the Tri-State Region as well as overseas for its efforts to gain accommodations to participate in the National High School Mock Trial Championship in Charlotte, North Carolina without being required to compete during the Jewish Sabbath.[5]
The Torah Bowl team won its first league championship in the 2004-05 school year, and won division titles in 2008-09 and 2009-10. The Science Olympiad team won the tournament the first two times it competed, in the 2003-04 and 2004-05 school years. After much controversy, the team was awarded first-place in the 2007-08 competition as well. The Olympiad team won again in 2010 and 2011, with Yakir Forman collecting 8 medals and Avi Ennis as the team mascot. Chess and College Bowl, in which TABC has won three consecutive JV and two straight varsity championships, are other popular activities - in 2011, led by captains Gavi Dov Hochsztein and Yakir Forman, TABC got 2nd place in the Yeshiva Chess League.
The school also publishes several publications that are distributed to synagogues and institutions mostly within the New York / New Jersey / Connecticut Tri-State Region. These include Kol Torah, the school's weekly Torah publication, and Israel Report, a weekly collection of news items relating to Israel.
Additionally, the school has a student run Video Publication known as TABC TV which videos and photographs most school functions, along with producing special original videos for various purposes such as the honoring of a teacher.
TABC's chemistry and physics teacher, Joel Berman, and its computer science teacher, Glen Marianko, run a summer science program for boys and girls in its computer and chemistry/physics labs. Also, both floor hockey teams run a little-league floor hockey league for boys from grades 4-8. Each summer, Rabbi Howard Jachter also runs a 1-week program for high school boys in which they learn a book of Tanach in depth.
The school also had a noted Model United Nations team which participates in the competition run by Yeshiva University competing against Jewish day schools from all over the United States.
The school also has both JV and varsity college bowl which won their respective championships last year.
Some other sport teams that TABC has include: Baseball, Softball, JV and Varsity Soccer, Ping-Pong, Tennis, Volley Ball, and a champion bowling team.
In an effort to build inter-community relationships in Teaneck, Torah Academy athletic director Bobby Kaplan and assistant principal Rabbi Tzvi Grumet, arranged for the TABC Storm to play a pair of exhibition basketball games in 2000 against the Knights of the Al-Ghazaly High School, a Muslim high school in the township.[6]
In the 2006-07 season, the Varsity Floor Hockey team, coached by Mo Fuchs, went undefeated (17-0) beating the Davis Renov Stahler in the championship game 3-1.
In the 2007-08 season the Varsity Floor Hockey team beat Davis Renov Stahler 2-1 in double overtime to claim the yeshiva league floor hockey championship for the second year in a row.
In the 2008-09 season the Junior Varsity Floor Hockey team beat Davis Renov Stahler 3-0 to capture the yeshiva league floor hockey championship.
In the 2009-10 season, both floor hockey teams made it to the championship game, with the JV team defeating Davis Renov Stahler 3-2 in overtime and the varsity team losing to DRS by a 2-1 score.[7]
In the 2010-11 season, the JV Hockey team won the MYHSHL championship for the third year in a row, defeating the Rambam Mesivta Ravens in the final by a score of 2-0. The MVP of that game was MYHSHL all-star Benjy Shulman.
TABC's largest sports program is the wrestling team which had placed 3rd in the Wittenberg Championships from 2007 to 2010.[8] In 2009, TABC had six finalists and two champions. In 2010, TABC had three champions - Navid Ahdoot (112 lbs), Evan Friedlander (171 lbs) and Dovid Greenfield (285 lbs) - as well as several second and third place wrestlers.[9] In 2011 TABC placed second overall with three first place winners including Shimmy Auman, Evan Friedlander, Dovid Greenfield. TABC wrestlers Efraim Ellman, Ramin Ahdoot and Lior Shachar have been inducted into the Wittenberg Hall of Fame.[8]
Additionally, the school also has both a varsity and junior varsity basketball team coached by Yeshiva League Hall of Fame Coach Bobby Kaplan.
The Yeshiva University Red Sarachek basketball tournament plays some of its games in the TABC gym, for which they got an award in 2004.
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