Lubavitch exchange rate US$1.00=A$18,000
A New York educator who tamed one of the city’s toughest schools inspired an auction held at the North Shore Chabad function of one of the Rebbe’s dollar notes for a record $18,000.
Rebbetzin Fruma Schapiro and Rabbi Nochum Schapiro stand behind Marisa and Shimon Waronker
Rabbi Nochum Schapiro told J-Wire that he had been auctioning the dollar bills for eight years but this was a record high despite the GFC.
Rabbi Schapiro said: “Shimon Waronker spoke to the NSW Parliament on Wednesday. But last night’s address at Le Montage was far less technical and much more personal and obviously touched hearts. He is a remarkable man.”
The 31-yr-old member of Chabad is an ex-US Army Intelligence Officer who used all his skills when he took on the job as principal of the South Bronx Public School No 22 and succeeded where all others before him had failed in turning the school’s record from being one of the worst in the city to a warm welcoming environment whose former gang-member students now aspire to be lawyers and doctors.
Rabbi Schapiro added: “People used to flock to the home the late Rebbe to get from him a blessed $ 1 note. They believed it would bring them luck. I have seen so many cases where people’s health and financial problems have been resolved within a very short period of time after procuring one of those bills. He taught us that the Chabad way is to focus on the individual and not the community….”
The late Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson passed away in 1994.
This morning, Waronker visited Sydney’s Masada College where he addressed more than 200 students from Years 7,8,9 and 11.
Head of Jewish Life and Hebrew, Auryt Jacobson, told J-Wire: “I have never seen the students like this before. He didn’t stand on the podium, opting to walk among them…and they were craning their heads like sunflowers to follow him and to catch every word he had to say.”
Waronker told the students that he had experienced confrontations with gang leaders and detailed one incident in which a female gang leader turned up at school instead of being in court where she had to face the bench following school suspension. Jacobson said: “He told her that he would escort her off the premises to which she responded ‘try it’. In a flash he had her pinned to to the floor and restrained her until the police arrived.”
The Masada students learned from the Crown Heights-based educator that the role of education is ‘to make heaven on earth’ and to make the world a better place.
