Jay Sommer
1981 National Teacher of the Year :: Foreign Languages :: New Rochelle High School, New Rochelle, New York
Jay Sommer, who came to the U.S. from Europe in 1948 and received his formal education through more than 20 years of night classes, has been named the 1981 National Teacher of the Year. Mr. Sommer, who speaks 10 languages fluently, was born in Germany in 1927 and raised in Czechoslovakia. His father died when he was in the fourth grade, forcing him to quit school and support his family. At age 12, he was incarcerated in a Nazi labor camp for the duration of World War II and in 1948 emigrated to the United States. Once here, he resumed his education at night – attending classes for 21 uninterrupted years.
Mr. Sommer says the attitudes of teachers and students have the greatest influence on learning. “The flow of warmth and affection between teacher and student as well as between student and student creates an atmosphere of mutual acceptance in which teaching and learning flourish,” he said. “I have learned that to create such an environment is one of the most important a teacher can pursue. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree from Brooklyn College, Master of Arts degrees in Spanish Language and Literature from Hunter College and in Russian from Fordham University. He has also completed all course work toward a Ph.D in Comparative Literature at New York University.
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Sally Frishberg
For all her bubbly warmth and enthusiasm, Sally Frishberg was once very quiet. As a child in Poland during World War II, she and her family hid from the Nazis in the attic of a Catholic man’s barn. Fifteen people crowded into the small space, surviving on what little food the man brought. They never spoke lest someone find them; her father mouthed stories from the newspaper and the family read his lips.
The retired schoolteacher’s story gripped the attention of fourth-graders from PS 187 in northern Manhattan, who visited the Holocaust Museum and Studies Center at the Bronx High School of Science on Nov. 29. Many of the children tried to put themselves in her shoes. “I would be tired. I would be bored. I would just give up,” said Adonis Munoz, 11, waiting for his lunch. He thought for a minute.
“I would go to different places where they don’t hurt people ‘cause they’re Jewish.” Three years after the Soviets liberated them in 1944, the family traveled by boat to the United States. Ms. Frishberg taught for years at Fort Hamilton High School in Brooklyn, where she lives. “And you’ll never get me out of there, no how,” she said.
With a kind, round face and short silver curls, she talked about being frightened and hurt as a little girl. In her two days in school before the Nazis banned education for Jews, teachers and children ostracized her. Even on the boat on the way to America, a European woman chided a 13-year-old Ms. Frishberg for jumping into a bunk she wanted for herself.
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LOUVINIA POINTER
When Noel Coward heard Louvinia’s voice, he wrote a part for her to sing in his musical “Set To Music,” starring Beatrice Lillie. This was her introduction to the Broadway stage. After that, she appeared with Alfred Lunt, and Lynne Fontaine in “The Pirate”, and broadways production of “Green Pastures”. Highly esteemed among her peers as a singer, teacher and choral conductor, her successful career includes work with some of the country’s outstanding teachers including Rosalie Miller, Samuel Margolis, Sarah Lee, Modena Scoval, and her long-time friend, coach and accompanist, the late Sylvia Olden Lee. Louvinia’s exceptional work as choral director of the National Youth Administration Radio Workshop won praise from notables such as Harry T. Burleigh, Fritz Mahler, Robert Hufstadder, Hall Johnson, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Mary McLeod Bethune.
She was a great inspiration to her very own children, especially the late Noel Pointer, the award-winning, classically trained violinist, who was celebrated for his enormous contributions to the world of jazz.
Louvinia took her love of music to the New York City school system, where for many years she was privileged to share her love of music and teaching gifts with the children of New York City. She taught in Public School 21, Lefferts Junior High School, Girls High and Tilden High Schools. During her twenty-six years teaching, she received numerous awards for her outstanding work.
Now retired, Mrs. Pointer is committed to the revival and preservation of the “Negro Spiritual”. Her dream of establishing an organization to preserve the Negro Spiritual became a reality in 1987 when The Great Day Chorale was formed. Now in its 20th season, the group, through the positive messages of these songs, has been an inspiration to listeners everywhere.
Louvinia said that, one of the best ways to learn about a people is through the study of their art. It is through their art that people reveal their inner feelings without restraint. In our quest to identify those qualities the American slaves possessed, that enabled them to endure such hardships, cruelty, and dehumanization and yet emerge as rational, functional beings, we must, I believe, examine their music, the Negro Spiritual. The simple beauty of these songs makes them ageless. Although they were birthed by a people who could neither read nor write, they embody all the elements of the greatest compositions ever written. A study of the Negro Spirituals dispels many of the negative myths about the slave. Sharing our findings through the performance of the spirituals is sure to help gain the respect of others for slaves and their descendants.
Just as the slaves received strength to persevere and overcome, it is my hope that the messages found in these songs will give people of all races, creeds, and stations in life the determination to rise above whatever holds them in bondage.
“Very early I realized my gift was music and as the years progressed, I felt my purpose was to share this gift with excellence, honesty and integrity. For the past 70 years I have been sharing my gift of music with all who would listen “, relayed Ms. Pointer.
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