Best in class – Torah Academy boys find work-life balance

Torah Academy Boys High School matriculant Ariyeh Zetisky commuted from Pretoria to the school in Johannesburg and then back every day during high school, including matric last year, but he considers finishing school a major success for two other reasons.

“Since I was a little kid, I never really enjoyed school,” he says. “School isn’t my thing. I’m happy it’s over. Another reason was that everyone told me before matric, ‘It’s so difficult.’ It wasn’t easy, but I didn’t find it so challenging and difficult. It was manageable.”

Zetisky went to school in Pretoria, where he lives, before coming to Torah Academy to get a Jewish education at the beginning of high school. He says travelling between the two cities was okay. “I used to leave home at about 06:20. Depending on what time I finished on the day, I could get home 12 hours later, at around 17:00 or 18:00, so it was difficult but manageable.”

Zetisky loves soccer, but while growing up in Pretoria, he could never join a club there as all the teams played matches on Shabbos. “It was also a bit tricky to join a club in Joburg because it would mean travelling even more than I usually do, but in Grade 9 or 10, I was scouted to play for Mamelodi Sundowns. Again, I had to turn it down because they play matches on Shabbos.”

Zetisky’s fellow 2022 Torah Academy Boys High School matriculant, Shoham Korzia, found matric challenging physically and mentally. “The build-up of stress combined with pressure from people around you to do your best is the most challenging part, but after managing to get past that, my matric year was fairly decent,” Korzia says.

He got through it by taking regular breaks from his studies, not working for too long or too late, and making sure he had time to do things he enjoyed or going out with friends.

Similarly, Zetisky found a balance by doing his quota of school work, “and then as soon as I had a break, not just sitting around and wasting my break, but organising a game of football, going out for a run, or doing anything productive in that time.”

Zetisky hated the COVID-19 pandemic because he likes being with people. “It wasn’t great sitting around looking at everyone on a screen. This year was much better because I enjoy in-class interactions with friends like the quick comments that you bounce off each other, which doesn’t really happen much online.”

Korzia says his most memorable moments in his final school year were “getting closer to my classmates and messing around with them in the very little free time we had. Also, becoming friends with the younger grades and being able to help them with things they were struggling with.”

Korzia will be taking part in Aardvark, a gap-year programme in Israel this year. “I’ll be touring Israel, attending a coding course, interning, as well as working on a summer camp in America.”

Zetisky, meanwhile, hopes to go to Israel this year and study in a yeshiva.