New Menahelet Esther Eisenman begins in August

In charge at Shalhevet

By Mayer Fertig

When the doors open in September for the third year of existence of Shalhevet High School for Girls, something new ­— someone new, really — will be there to greet the students: a principal.

Her name is Esther Eisenman and she is currently finishing her tenure as High School Judaic Studies Principal at Beth Tfiloh Dahan Community School in Baltimore, Maryland, where she has been for 11 years.

Students should be forewarned: the new Menahelet, as she’ll be known, will see right through attempts at schoolhouse lawyering — she practiced law for 10 years with stints at firms in New York City and Baltimore.

“They’re not disconnected fields,” Eisenman said with a laugh during a telephone interview on Tuesday evening. “You have to be very persuasive with a judge and a jury, and in this case the jury would be the students.”

In addition to her law degree, Eisenman earned a Bachelors in English from Stern College for Women and a Masters in Judaic Studies and Jewish Education from The Baltimore Hebrew Institute at Towson University.

“I did not actually wake up one morning and say ‘I think I should be a Jewish educator,’” she explained about her career switch. “Even while I was practicing law I was giving shiurim.”

While her kids where young she decided to take some time off from the law. She got her Masters at that point, and was teaching adult education programs at the school she now heads. She was invited to teach at the high school as well and gradually took on more and more responsibility.

“And I stayed,” she said. “I didn’t know that it would be a permanent career decision for me. I loved it.”

Mrs. Eisenman is originally from Brooklyn, her husband, David, a teacher, is from Monsey. They have lived in Baltimore for 19 years; with all three of their children now out of the house, it’s a good time for a change, she said.

During Shalhevet’s short existence two other accomplished educators had previously been named Menahelet — Rebbetzin Rivka Blau, who resigned before the school even opened, and Rebbetzin Rookie Billet, whose agreement to join Shalhevet next September apparently ended before it could begin, when the Hebrew Academy of The Five Towns and Rockaway (HAFTR) severed its ties with Shalhevet, and brother school Rambam Mesivta, last summer.

“Third time’s the charm; what can I say,” Eisenman responded, when asked about her distinguished erstwhile predecessors.

Shalhevet’s near death experience last summer did not cause her to hesitate for a moment about becoming its leader.

“The school had a crisis for a moment and, very quickly, the parent body stepped up to the plate and showed their commitment to the school ... I’m sure it was very dramatic at the time, but it’s something that happened. So the answer is no, it did not give me pause,” she said. “If anything, it probably encouraged me more. The level of dedication of the parent body — that says a lot about the school.”

Eisenman joins Rabbi Zev Meir Friedman, the Rosh HaYeshiva of Rambam Mesivta and Shalhevet, and Rabbi Yotav Eliach, her counterpart at Rambam. Both men have taken strong leadership roles in Shalhevet in the absence of a full-time menahelet.

“I’m very excited to be affiliated with Rambam,” she said. “We share faculty. They weren’t building on nothing” in creating Shalhevet, she observed. It’s an excellent school. Its commitment to values and middot and Am Yisrael are all things that are in the girls school as well, and that’s why the girls’ school is so successful.”

Eisenman is also committed to the Rambam-Shalhevet blueprint of public activism.

“I completely agree with that,” she said. “The school I’m coming from also really stresses leadership in the outside world; leadership in Jewish causes; taking an active role in the world.”

“Not to diminish the book knowledge,” Eisenman said, but “education isn’t only what happens in the classroom. It’s also what happens at assemblies and programs. That is a key to reaching students and it’s something I’m incredibly committed too.”