ICEJ-Sponsored Agro-Tech High School Bids Farewell to First Class

By Naomi Ammon

Under warm strands of string lights and an ink-blue evening sky, the very first class of the Adam v’Adama agro-tech high school, sponsored by the Christian Embassy since its launch two years ago, celebrated their graduation with family and friends on their campus only a few kilometres from Gaza. It marked two years of study, hard work, personal growth, and bonds of friendship formed with fellow students and the surrounding community of Sde Nitzan.

True to their trail-blazing, industrious and independent spirit, the students arranged their own graduation ceremony, preparing homemade pasta and quiche for their guests, singing songs, and delivering farewell speeches.

ICEJ Vice President of Aid and Aliyah, Nicole Yoder, and her able assistant Jannie Tolhoek were especially honoured to share this special moment of achievement with the inaugural class, since the ICEJ has been a partner of Adam v’Adama from its beginning.

Two years ago, the trauma of the October 7 terror invasion was still freshly seared in the hearts of Israelis, and starkly visible in the destroyed towns and farming villages of the Gaza border area. Sde Nitzan urgently needed farmers and field workers to continue planting, growing and harvesting produce for the nation. However, almost everyone was evacuated, and the thundering booms of Hamas rocket barrages from nearby Gaza routinely echoed overhead.

In this climate, 30 courageous students enrolled in the brand new Adam v’Adama high school. They did not know their teachers or the full curriculum, and had no physical classrooms yet. But they did have abundant hopes and dreams, believing that with hard work, trust, time, and a desire to serve their country, they would learn how to become cutting-edge Israeli farmers.

We could report more detail on their rigorous schedule, how the students rose before the sun to work in the fields, spent the afternoon in classes, and the evening studying Torah and making music. We could tell about the agricultural breakthroughs they have made, and how one students’ mushroom cross-breeding project will be published and further researched by a leading university. We could write about the practical hope and help they gave to the local community, as these young students from the next generation responded to terror and tragedy by choosing to flourish and bloom in the desert. Where there were once literal ashes from fires intended to incinerate whole Israeli communities in the Western Negev – which supply 60% of Israel’s produce – today there are thriving orchards of oranges, fields of cucumbers, and trellises of tomatoes.

But it would be more meaningful to let these remarkable students share in their own words, one-by-one, what the agro-tech school has meant to them.

Every morning when I wake before the sun I’m exhausted. I have the urge to turn the alarm off and go back to sleep. But I decide to get up, brush my teeth, and go outside. I work. I don’t give up on myself before I even start. This choice is a victory over everyone who says it’s impossible, strong proof that anything is possible if I want. These are the moments that shaped these years.

All the emotions I felt, the connections I made, the exciting conversations, the rolling laughter, returning to my room at the end of the day and feeling this crazy satisfaction and feeling, “Wow, I did something meaningful today”, all shaped my experience here. 

When someone is present in the mental and physical senses, she can breathe. When she doesn’t want to be somewhere else, she can be happy. And I was happy here. When we girls went out to dance in the sprinklers, when we woke up at three in the morning to set off on a journey, when we rode our bikes through the fields of Sde Nitzan, when we went to school and picked flowers to put in our hair, the satisfaction of work when we finish a line of seedlings, the hours of conversation as we worked in the orchard…

Before, I believed that someone must be born with talent and that’s how they achieve success. What this program helped me realise is that any person can achieve huge success. A person’s success does not depend only on talent, but hard work, investment, perseverance and effort.

We were working in the greenhouse, spraying dahlia seedlings. There was about an hour left to work, it was hot, and we weren’t close to being done. And then in one moment we all just decided, “We’re finishing the greenhouse; there is no way we won’t.” Everyone started working full speed, not resting for a moment. When Assaf arrived, he was shocked, he couldn’t believe how we managed to finish so quickly.

The beginning wasn’t easy for me. I fell asleep in so many classes, I was tired most of the day, I couldn’t really function. Then came a moment engraved in my mind. We journeyed up to the compound and raised the flag together, everyone walking quietly and in the background, hearing bombs from Gaza. I immediately realised I was in the right place. I was doing the right thing. I wasn’t breaking down. And I stayed here until the end.

Today, Adam v’Adama is bigger, brighter and healthier than ever. They have state-of-the art facilities (dorms, new classrooms, a greenhouse and learning center) and extraordinary teachers. One instructor shared: “I do not just teach my students about English, I teach them about life.”

This special high school is a physical expression of community, service, sacrifice, patriotism and love. The ICEJ is truly honoured to partner with Adam v’Adama and look forward to countless future graduating classes with anticipation and joy. To contribute to the mission of this special agro-tech school, and many similar rebuilding projects near Israel’s northern and southern borders, please give to our “Israel in Crisis” fund.