There are some couples who plan to make aliyah from their first date; that was not Daniella and Jeffrey. Neither Daniella, who is from Toronto, nor Jeffrey who is from White Plains, NY came from overly Zionist families. Aliyah was a far-off idea and with Daniella working as a speech therapist and Jeffrey as a real estate manager, they felt very settled in Riverdale, NY. When Covid started, Jeffrey made periodic comments like “maybe we should think about aliyah…” but in a very off-handed way. In January 2021, he filled out a Nefesh b’Nefesh application but Daniella didn’t give it much thought.
In May 2021, Israel was under rocket attack and antisemitism in New York started to heat up. Suddenly, Jeffrey felt like he needed to wear a baseball cap on his commute to work and he wasn’t comfortable with their young boys wearing kippot and tzitzit when they went out. All of this led to the day that Jeffrey came home and told Daniella that he really felt the time had come to make aliyah. This time, they really talked it through. Daniella’s siblings were already in Israel (her parents later joined them!) and they knew that if they were going to progress past the “talking stage,” they had to take action and they decided to make aliyah the next summer.
“One of our kids was born with a genetic deletion and has developmental delay,” Daniella explains, “That year, she began first grade in a new special ed school and in the first few months, we saw her thriving like we couldn’t believe. Every time we went to a school event, we walked out thinking ‘how can we take her out of this school? It’s amazing and she’s doing so well!’ We discussed waiting another year but we knew that if we told ourselves to wait one more year, we would keep telling ourselves that year after year and find more excuses. There really is never a good time to relocate your family across the world! We had to decide whether we should go for the overall benefit of our family’s future or stay back for one child’s needs. So, we set out on an adventure to navigate special ed in a foreign country, in a foreign language.”
They made aliyah in August 2022 to Ramat Bet Shemesh. Beforehand, they got reports and evaluations translated to Hebrew and submitted them to the educational committee. “Thankfully there was a special-ed Olim coordinator who walked me through the process step by step,” says Daniella. “In true Israeli style, she didn’t always respond and I had to be on her case, but ultimately, she was invaluable. She got a vaada meeting (IEP meeting) scheduled over Zoom even before we got to Israel and attended the meeting to help advocate and translate between Hebrew and English. Of course, it was held at 3 a.m. NY time (!) but we were able to set our daughter up for a kita mekademet (small class).
“Three months after our aliyah, we were called in to discuss why this class wasn’t working for her, which felt devastating. It definitely gave us pause for thought about how we had moved our family across the world and already within two months the school was setting up meetings to see where she could go next. But honestly, there was tremendous hashgacha. The school felt bad she was struggling and by Chanukah time, they worked to get her ten hours of private ulpan and with all of this one-on-one time, she was the first of our kids to master Hebrew! In the meantime, we realized that she actually needed a kita tikshoret (a class focused on communication for kids on the spectrum), but no such class existed for girls her age in Bet Shemesh.” Daniella refused to accept this as an answer and despite being a new olah, she went on a hunt to find girls to form a class. Miraculously, by the end of July, she found just enough girls and the school committee agreed to hold emergency meetings for these girls the first week of August. “At the end of the meeting, the committee turned to me and said, ‘Mazel tov! You did it! We will be opening a class on September 1.’ It was an incredible feeling. Baruch Hashem, our daughter has succeeded in this class tremendously this year and it’s so rewarding, especially knowing how hard we worked to make it happen!
“While coming to Israel with a child that has an IEP is daunting, it is doable. Find the WhatsApp groups for special education in your desired community and ask all the questions you have. These moms are the most knowledgeable and most supportive resources you will ever find and they all just want to help one another navigate these unchartered waters. Never in a million years did I think that I would be looking for kids in the same situation as my daughter (let alone find them!!) and helping to get a brand-new class open only eleven months after aliyah. While we were successful in getting a new class open, I realize it isn’t always possible but don’t shy away from trying.
“Post October 7, we both feel strongly that we made the best possible decision for our family. We feel incredibly safe here and when we see the videos coming out of America today, it continuously reinforces our decision. The college campuses are the future of America and if that’s what’s going on there, it is frightening to think what could happen. As for us, our kids are independent and happy, we try to go to the Kotel every Rosh Chodesh and we take our kids on Chol HaMoed tiyulim showing them places from Tanach. It’s unbelievable to see the awe in their eyes to be walking in the same places that they’re learning about in school in Torah or Navi. We encourage everyone to at least fill out a Nefesh b’Nefesh application and start considering joining us here! (I’m happy to help anyone navigate the special Ed system if needed.)
