Newspaper Article - Providence Youth Council

Panda Cave renovated

By Devin Felix

(Logan Herald Journal: Tuesday, February 24, 2009)

PROVIDENCE — Even a cave can use a sprucing up now and then. Providence Elementary School’s Panda Cave — a room behind the school’s wall-sized panda mural — is getting a makeover. The room, which is used by reading groups and as a library for literacy materials, got a new coat of paint last week, applied as a service project by the Providence City Youth Council. New shelves are scheduled to be installed in the room today, and volunteers will then label them and organize the books, said Principal Curt Jenkins.

“A lot of good things happen here, a lot of good reading,” said Shanna Guymon, a speechlanguage
pathologist at the school who supervised the youth council’s work.

The room is behind a wall, on which a volunteer years ago painted a huge mural showing a panda, bamboo and other plants. On the door, a painted sign reads “Panda Cave.”

The school, one of Cache County School District’s older buildings, has seen lots of changes over the years.

The Panda Cave used to be a locker room years ago, said kindergarten teacher Kerren Coburn. It also used to house a preschool library.

“This is a school where every nook and cranny is used,” Coburn said.

Miriah Manley, a 17-year-old member of the Providence Youth City Council, said involvement in the community is a big part of the council’s mission.

“We have lots of siblings who go to this school, and it’s a good way to be involved,” Manley said.

The renovation will be paid for by a $5,000 grant from the Lowe’s Charitable and Educational Foundation.

Ner Tamid Award @ Scout Shabbat

Saturday, February 7th, 2009, was a proud day for the Whitney family. After many months of hard work, Joshua received his Ner Tamid award, the religious emblem for Jewish Boy Scouts.

For several months, Congregation Brith Sholem's student rabbi, Ethan Bair, has worked closely with Joshua on the requirements for this award. As luck would have it, this weekend (Scout Shabbat) was the one weekend in February that Ethan was scheduled to visit our congregation. This was wonderful because that meant that Rabbi Ethan was able to make the presentation to Joshua personally.


To support Joshua, Tom Hogan (Joshua's Scoutmaster from Troop #1) drove down with his wife, Connie, to attend the service and presentation. Attending a synagogue service was a first time event for the Hogan family and they thoroughly enjoyed themselves. We are so happy that they were able to attend... it meant so much to us all that they were willing to make the drive from Logan and sit through a three hour Shabbat morning service.


Coincidentally, Tom Hogan received the "District Award of Merit" in Logan that same day at the Old Ephraim distict recognition dinner. I guess it is because Tom is the kind of Scout Master who is willing to spend 5 hours of his "day off" to support one of his scouts!

Here is Joshua's speech that he read to the congregation:

--- Ner Tamid Emblem Acceptance Speech---

Well, I have just received my Ner Tamid Emblem, but I’m sure a couple of you must be thinking, what is that? Well, it’s the religious emblem for Jewish Boy Scouts. The reason it is called the Ner Tamid Emblem, is that the actual Ner Tamid is the eternal light over the ark, and this award represents the eternal light of Jewish learning.

Working on this has been a good opportunity for me to learn more about Judaism. As I am working towards my Bar Mitzvah this summer, I found that much of the research has helped me prepare for my Bar Mitzvah.

To complete the requirements, I had to learn more about all aspects of leading a Jewish life. By studying the Torah, I found out about some early biblical history, and learning about the prayers helped me better understand what I’m saying when I attend synagogue.

By participating in group celebrations such as Sukkot, the Chanukah Party, and Simchat Torah with my congregation helps us all celebrate better as a community. We have more fun and we fulfill the commandments better.

At my synagogure, I have been attending Shabbat services at least twice a month. Once in December, I helped lead the service with my B’Nai Mitzvah class. This was not only good practice for our upcoming bar and bat mitzvahs, but also showed we have the ability to lead services and want to be involved in the synagogue. This is especially important here because we don’t have a full time rabbi, and so it’s up to the members to lead services the majority of the time.

Locally, I learned about many Jewish organizations that operate in Utah, such as: Hillel, Chabbad, the JCC, Jewish Family & Child Services, and the Jewish Federation (which helps support our religious school). These organizations help to strengthen our small Jewish community here in Utah.

As per many of the requirments, I learned about the geography of Israel, some of the founders of the modern state of Israel, such as: Theodore Hertzl, the Founder of Modern Political Zionism; Chaim Weizman, the first President of Israel; David Ben Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel; and Golda Meir, the first female Prime Minister of Israel; and important organizations that helped rebuild Israel, such as: the Jewish National Fund; Jewish Agency; and Histadrut. Without individuals and groups like these working together, Jews would probably still not have a homeland.

Overall, I would say that working on my Ner Tamid emblem was a great experience. I encourage other scouts within this congregation to work on their religious emblem also, because while doing it, I have become a more knowledgeable Jew, and a Jew who wishes to be involved in this synagogue.

Finally, here is a group shot of everyone that attended the Scout Shabbat service at Congregation Brith Sholem --- Saturday, February 7th, 2009.

From left to right: Jaques Behar, David Whitney, Gillian Whitney, Ridge Boyle, Max Boyle, Joshua Whitney, & Tom Hogan.

*Jacques Behar is a member of Congregation Brith Sholem and life-time Scouter. We were thrilled to have met him for the first time at this Scout Shabbat!

*Ridge & Max Boyle are members of Congregation Brith Sholem and scouts with Troop #4 & Pack #4 in Ogden.

* Tom Hogan is the Scoutmaster with Troop #1 in Logan.

Ski bunnies

Well I guess we are finally UTAH residents now. Our boys are ski bunnies. A few weeks ago, USU had a special event for faculty up at Beaver Moutain.

The boys had their first introduction to skiing. It took a long time just to get all our equipment. Who knew that renting the right boots, skis, & poles would take so long.

Once they were all geared up... it was time to meet the instructor. Lucky thing for Joshua and David that they were the only students. They had a wonderful one-on-one session with the instructor.

So now that the boys have had a good introduction to skiing... they are itchy to get up on those slopes and ski. Unfortunately, between mine and Devon's backs... we're in no shape to go with them. We are hoping that maybe we can get the boys up on the slopes in the next few months...either by themselves or when Phil, Jenica, & Ben come out to Utah in March.

Dachshunds in the snow!

Max is not too sure about all the white stuff that has appearing in our back yard. I think that he is still debating on whether he is a UT dog or an AZ dog. When Max finally does venture forth into the snow... he does what he needs to do... and races back in the house at full steam. His favorite place to be now is right in front of the fireplace.

Coco seems to enjoy the snow now. This year she has really fattened up... so she seems to have a lot of extra "Coconess" to keep her warm. On top of that, she still likes to wear all her fancy jackets, we just have a hard time keeping them done up! I think maybe there is just a little bit more Coco for the jackets to wrap themselves around this winter.

Here is a picture of how pretty our house looks agains the snowy back drop of the mountians. As you can see our neighbor's trees don't obstruct our view in the winter. One nice thing about Utah is that we get a lot of blue sunny skies. It seems that we only get overcast days if there is precipitation.