New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
HEART OF GOLDIE
Woodbridge resident, longtime teacher Goldie Taub honored for 100th birthday
WOODBRIDGE — Goldie Taub, a devoted Jew and longtime schoolteacher who saw the promise in every student that she taught, no matter how difficult, family members said, celebrated her 100th birthday at the Coachman Square in Woodbridge this week.
A small but jovial group gathered at the assisted living facility Monday afternoon to recognize the centenarian and honor her many achievements and contributions throughout her storied career as both an educator and person of faith. Among those in attendance were Taub’s three children, her boyfriend Murray Levine and state Sen. Jorge Cabrera, who presented Taub with a proclamation.
To commemorate the milestone, Coachman Square staff members presented her with a vanilla cake decorated with “100” in rainbow-colored sprinkles, and a fancy tiara that Taub wore during the event.
Taub worked as an elementary school teacher in her native New Jersey for more than 40 years, helping shape the minds of hundreds of kindergarten and second-grade students. When Taub recognized that her students struggled with reading, she adopted a new style of learning called “organic reading” and started incorporating that method into her teaching with great success. That work won her a teachers association award in New Jersey.
Taub’s son, Larry Taub, 72, said Tuesday that his mother’s strength as a teacher was her ability to discern the “light in every child,” regardless of how much trouble they might give her. “It didn’t matter how difficult the child was — she found some good in every kid and they knew it,” Larry Taub said. “She just had a wonderful feeling for all of the kids in her classes.”
According to her son, Goldie Taub’s passion for education descended from her parents, immigrants from Russia who, although they never went to college, understood the value of getting a degree. In the 1940s, Taub graduated from Trenton State Teachers College — now the College of New Jersey — during a time when many women were being denied the opportunity to pursue higher education.
Like her parents, Taub handed down that hunger for education to her children, all of whom have graduated from college, her son said. “Education was always a very important issue in our family,” Larry Taub said. “We all were certainly expected to go to college, and we all did.”
Goldie Taub also was involved heavily as a member of her local Jewish community, helping to found Temple Beth-El in Hillsborough, N.J., which is “still going strong,” Larry Taub said.
Now, at 100, Taub is one of the temple’s last living founders, according to her son.
Opened in the 1950s, the temple served as another option for more progressive Jews living in the Hillsborough area who did not want to attend an Orthodox congregation, which at the time was the only other Jewish place of worship nearby, Larry Taub said.
In addition to working in the New Jersey public school system, Goldie Taub also taught young children at a nursery school situated inside the temple, her son said. Years after she stopped teaching there, Goldie Taub would sometimes return to read to the kids, who playfully called her “Grandma Goldie.”
After retiring to the New Haven area in the early 2000s, Taub became a volunteer tutor for many years in the New Haven Public School system where she continued her love for education by teaching children how to read.
Goldie Taub is still revered by those belonging to the Temple Beth-El, Larry Taub said. And on Monday, she was presented with 150 birthday cards that had been crafted by former students and friends she knew through the temple.
In addition to the colorful cards, Taub also received various birthday gifts, including a journal from her son and his wife; she takes a writing class at Coachman Square, her son said. Last year, she penned a Letter to the Editor published in the New Haven Register in support of President Joe Biden’s “Build Back Better” bill, which included investments in early childhood education.
“As a 98-year-old retired kindergarten teacher of many years, I taught children from a variety of backgrounds,” Taub wrote. “The one thing they shared was all had parents who cared about their children’s education. I remember making home visits and some of my students didn’t have heat, but they did have parents who cared about their education and having a better life.”
Besides reading and writing, Goldie Taub enjoys watching MSNBC News “all day long,” Larry Taub said, and playing bingo every night after dinner with her partner, retired Rabbi Murray Levine, who also lives at the assisted living facility. The couple have been together for nearly 20 years. “We all sort of sit there and marvel that she’s 100 and she’s as sharp as she is and she looks as good,” Larry Taub said. “We feel very lucky and she feels very lucky.”