This year, the “Last Bell” celebration at the leading educational institution of the Dnipro Jewish community — Jewish Lyceum No. 144 named after Levi Yitzchak Schneerson — was held in the “Sinai” Hall of the world’s largest Jewish center, the Menorah, as part of a major event marking the end of the 2024/2025 academic year.
There will be a separate report about the first part of this event — the “Success Award 2025” ceremony — and today’s story is all about how the “Last Bell” celebration unfolded, with the spotlight on the graduates who are leaving the lyceum — if not forever, then for a long time. And if they do return, it will be not as students, but as parents of students or as teachers.
The first to take the stage, however, were the first-graders, for whom this was the very first school year they completed. It was they who invited the stars of the day to the stage — the current 11th-grade students.
The creative team behind the celebration prepared everything in a deeply touching and emotional way — the graduates were addressed by none other than themselves, only from the future. It was a look at who they might become — grown, responsible, and self-aware individuals.
Together with the Jewish Lyceum, the Dnipro Jewish Community proudly congratulates the graduates of 2025:
– Chaya Mushka Dorfman
– Shira Dorfman
– Natali Serhienko
– Elina Fridman
– Maria Shyriaieva
– Bohdan Hruba
– Lev Dolnik
– Yan Kotlyar
– Roman Kroshevych
– Anton Makarenko
In honor of the graduates, there were songs, dances, heartfelt words, and gifts from the Nikitenko family. On stage appeared their very first teacher, Daria Barkova, who fondly recalled what they were like as children, and their final homeroom teacher — Halyna Kidalova — who proudly gave each of them a sincere blessing for the road ahead.
The emotional finale of the event was the symbolic ringing of the last school bell, given by the 11th-graders themselves after they expressed gratitude to their teachers, parents, the Dnipro Jewish Community, and its Chief Rabbi, Shmuel Kaminezki.
