“Mom! I’m having a major shoe crisis!” I yelled, as I shoved mounds of clothes into my suitcase. My mother walked into my room and frowned -- it was one hour till takeoff from LA to Poland, and my suitcase was overflowing, unable to zip. “Yes? she asked, clearly unamused. “Okay so basically, I want to take my Allstars AND my Adidas, because one is black and one is white, and I like them both, but they don’t both fit, and I don’t know what to do!!”

At the close of a Town Hall devoted to davening behavior and food cleanup issues, Head of School Rabbi Ari Segal turned the running...