Brooklyn Ethical Partners with Safed House for Special Contest

Brooklyn Ethical Partners with Safed House for Special Contest

 A special Contest

Learn more

Safed House strives to shift the narrative around refugees in America from one dominated by statistics and fear to one rooted in compassion and admiration.

Brooklyn Ethical Partners with Safed house for a special Contest

Since 2017, Safed House has proudly hosted its Annual Essay Contest—our flagship youth program designed to amplify the voices of high school students who have personally migrated to the United States. This legacy initiative reflects our deep commitment to honoring the human-interest stories of refugees and recent immigrants, offering a secure and empathetic platform for self-expression. This year, Safed House is launching the New York City Essay Contest, and we are partnering with them to help young people find belonging, celebrate their resilience, and support their educational journey.

Each year, they invite high school students to share their lived experiences in a 500-word essay that speaks to identity, transition, and hope. Safed House invites them to share their story while protecting their privacy and identity.  At a time when misinformation and discrimination are so visible in our society, it is particularly important for the stories of young people to be heard. 

 

 

Get Involved

The contest is open to students who were born outside the United States and migrated here within the past ten years or have been displaced from their homelands. While we especially encourage Palestinian students to apply, reflecting our organization’s commitment to uplifting voices from Palestine, we welcome all refugee and recently arrived immigrant youth who meet the eligibility criteria.

Click Here to Learn More and Apply

Ethics for Youth

Ethics for Children is now ETHICS FOR YOUTH!!!

Service and community projects, games, field trips, special guests, art, theater, and ethics in action.

That’s right—Ethics!

Ethics for Youth

The Ethics for Youth program is a fun, safe, interactive learning environment for kids and teens to investigate important topics that affect their lives and to deepen their understanding of their roles in their personal and broader communities.  Our program fosters empathy, a deeper understanding of self and others, and empowers students to make a difference in their world.

How do we do it? Each of our weekly classes features a lesson drawn from our 5 core principles: Caring for Self, Family, Community, Society (our world community), and the Earth. Our lessons utilize participatory learning through art, theatre, games, music, discussion, reflection, and most importantly – action, through service projects and collaborative work with a diversity of communities and organizations.

Our lessons and service projects are influenced by student passions and interests.  Our program does not impose a fixed set of values or beliefs. Rather, our goal is to provide experiences that can broaden their perspectives and a space where students can identify their own values, expand their knowledge, and gain skills essential to developing and following their own moral compass and voice.   All of our classes participate in the service projects, field trips, and welcome special guests throughout the year. Families are not expected to participate but are welcome to do so if they wish to join us.

Want to see our curriculum for the 2026-2027 year? CLICK HERE!

Growing Ethics (Ages 5–8 yo)

Empathy, Connection, & Creative Play

Children at this age are natural philosophers and eager explorers. Through games, art, music, and cooperative games, our youngest participants explore their connection to the world, themselves, their families, communities, and their environment.
Register Here

Evolving Ethics – (ages 9 – 12 yo)

Emerging Voices, Big Questions, & Meaningful Play

We honor this time of transition by encouraging them to explore the issues that genuinely capture their imagination. Through hands-on, student-driven projects, thoughtful dialogue, and games, we provide a safe harbor for them to wrestle with big ideas, shape their own values, and recognize the power of their unique voices.
Register Here

Community Coming-of-Age (Ages 13+)

A New Milestone for Tweens & Teens – Living Ethics

As students grow, so does their impact. We are thrilled to introduce our new Community Coming-of-Age Program. This immersive, year-long, project-based journey is designed specifically for teens and tweens to take the lead. Backed by the mentorship of the broader Brooklyn Ethical community, older students tackle big questions through collaborative community projects and celebrate their transition into young adulthood by stepping up as true changemakers in a culmination ceremony. 

Register Here

Free Trial Class Sunday, Sept 20 at 10:30 am. Register HERE!

Fall Term:
September 20 (Trial Class), 27
October 4, 11 (Special Community Trip Day), 18, 26
November 1, 8, 15, 22 

Winter Term:
 December 6, 13, 20
January 10, 17, 24, 31
February 7, 28
March 7

Spring Term:
March 14, 21
April 4,  11, 18
May 2, 16, 23
June 6, 13 (End-of-Year Ceremony)

Classes are held on Sundays from 10:30 a.m. – 12 pm
at Brooklyn Ethical,  265 4th Avenue, Brooklyn. 

Price: $175 per term or $500 per full year

Click HERE to register

Full and partial scholarships are available.

Have any questions for us? Please send us a message, and we will get back to you right away.

Subscribe to our Ethics for Children mailing list for updates

Our Teachers

WURRM
Growing Ethics (ages 5 – 8yo)
WURRM is an antidisciplinary performance artist and community organizer with a background in children’s literacy programming, litigation dispute resolution, and STEM public art installations. Currently, they organize with an unschooling collective and a solarpunk collective to share a growth mindset ethos. Guided by the principle that play is the practice of what we’ve learned, WURRM is excited to explore the complex and illuminating nature of ethics through child-led, experiential, immersive play including song, dance, games, and art.
“The children are always ours, every single one of them, all over the globe…”
-James Baldwin

SKY
Evolving Ethics (ages 9 – 12 yo)
Sky is a New York City born and raised art educator. Teaching through multiple mediums over the past seven years in public schools across the five boroughs, Sky specializes in comic book making, drawing and painting. Sky hopes to create a space for kids to exist in their uninhibited selves- free from judgment- with their ideas and thoughts being valued and understood. In their free time, Sky loves to illustrate, cook, and further pour into their community by collaborating and learning with and from their friends and neighbors.

SUNEHRA
Community Coming-of-Age (Ages 13+) – Living Ethics
Sunehra Subah (she/hers) was born and raised in Ozone Park, NY, always wanting to teach in the same city she grew up in! She is currently studying to get her initial certification for 7-12 English Education at Teachers’ College, Columbia. Sunehra believes in a vision of storytelling as a social justice project, and she is excited to put that vision into practice at Brooklyn Ethical. When she is not teaching, she can be found writing poetry, making playlists, or eating at her favorite restaurant, Nyonya, with a loved one!

Special Events

Sept 20, 2026

Trial Class

Want to try a class? Join us on Sept 20 at 10:30. RSVP so we know you are coming, Space is limited.
Sign up
Sep 27, 2026

First Day of Classes

Our classes officially start Sept 27!
Register for the classes

Cultivating Empathy, Self-Knowledge and Inspiring Action

  .

All Ages Science Day (with pictures)

All Ages Science Day (with pictures)

Last Sunday, we had our first All-Ages Science Day, with a full house across both our spaces at 265 and 269 4th Avenue.

The day started with a flood in the 269 space, which was a challenge because one of the highlights of our day was an hour-long movie by Homegrown National Park, and we had close to 50 people in attendance. Thanks to a determined group of volunteers and two hours of brushing, mopping, wiping, and running several fans, the space was ready for the screening before the event began (a little damp, but smelling and looking clean and neat).

The event kicked off with several activity tables featuring insect-themed crafts, a collection of 25 live critters viewed under magnifying glasses (ranging from designer blue isopods to giant cicada killer wasps), rare insects preserved in amber to classify, and even an edible insect buffet. The tasting table sparked some very amusing reactions and was so popular that lines formed to sample everything from Mexican-spiced waxworms to salted caterpillars and crickets.

After the movie, we held an all-ages trivia match (the kids beat the adults effortlessly), and then we all headed outside to release 2,000 live ladybugs. Some of us ended up covered in the little critters, and even those who weren’t sure if they wanted to hold live insects quickly warmed up to the idea, proudly walking around with ladybugs crawling across their hands and arms.

It was a super fun event that focused on educating people of all ages about the importance of the smallest of creatures to our biodiversity, and fostering love and a desire to protect them and the habitats they need to survive.

I am so grateful to everyone who volunteered to help make this happen:

  • Damon, Jens (Sarah Jensen’s husband), Bill, Vincent, and Saeed: The amazing cleanup crew that tackled the water in 269 in record time.

  • Maria (EfC Parent), Sarah J., Janna, and Michele Sharon (our member from Texas who was visiting): Thank you for helping organize the rooms at 265, making signs, and staffing the activity tables with warm smiles and unwavering willingness to help. Maria even brought a few critters to add to the display!

  • Our youth team—Bea, Nadine, Niyah, and Tahra: You worked hard carrying furniture, cleaning, making signs, staffing tables with enthusiasm and care, and sharing your knowledge to make the day a complete success.

  • The Park Slope Homeschoolers’ Playgroup: A shoutout for helping catch the giant cicada killer wasp and several other local insects for our display (all were carefully fed and released back into Prospect Park later that Sunday).

I can’t wait to do it again!

Taty

Below are pictures from the day, including some brave bug-eaters, new ladybug lovers, and a lot of happy smiles.

 
 

CLICK ON THE PICTURES BELOW FOR SLIDES.

All Ages Talent Show (with pictures)

All Ages Talent Show (with pictures)

This year’s Annual All-Ages Talent Show was a huge success and showed us that talent really comes in all ages! We had children as young as 3yo doing magic tricks, singing, showing us somersaults, doing an awesome stand-up routine, and even quizzing us on a science space trivia that had us hopelessly guessing. We had teens reading moving and personal poems, playing Chinese music on the violin, drawing portraits of attendees, and hosting the event! We also had adults of all ages sharing their painting skills, doing comedy sketches, and doing a theatrical juggling routine that had us all laughing. We can’t wait for next year to check out what new talents we will learn about!

 
 

CLICK ON THE PICTURES BELOW FOR SLIDES.

Brooklyn Ethical Celebrate Pride (with pictures)

Brooklyn Ethical Celebrate Pride (with pictures)

Last weekend, we joined the Brooklyn Pride Celebration in two major ways. We had a booth at the Pride Fair in Brooklyn where some of our members helped spread the word about our programs and what we do, and we hosted an “All Ages Decorate for Pride” event. Members and visitors of all ages (truly, our youngest attendee was 2 months old!) created fun decorations for the parade, including giant necklaces, bracelets, decorated bricks in honor of Stonewall, pride fans, and more. A group of members then went to watch the pride parade together, branding our newly made decorations! Thank you to all who attended, who helped us with our booth, and to Angel for her creative ideas for projects.

 
 

CLICK ON THE PICTURES BELOW FOR SLIDES.