Our Campus and Community - Brawerman Elementary School

Dedicated in 1998, the Irmas Campus of Wilshire Boulevard Temple is an architecturally significant complex of buildings occupying a full acre in West Los Angeles. The Brawerman Elementary School occupies over 90,000 square feet of classrooms, labs, art centers, and recreational facilities.

Joint programming with both Brawerman East and West allows students the opportunity to experience our diverse, multicultural Wilshire Center neighborhood, as well as our historic campus located in Wilshire Center and Koreatown.

Brawerman West Features:

Playground
State-of-the-art Gymnasium
Library
Art Studio
Large Chapel and Auditorium
Science Lab
Technology Lab
Sports Field
Music Studio
Climbing Wall

Our Community

When You Know, You Know

The Brawerman experience may begin in the classroom but it extends far beyond. Families describe a warm and close-knit community that looks beyond itself to offer betterment, improvement, and empowerment, where parents support the children and each other.

Brawerman West is an intimate environment with small class sizes where teachers get to know and truly care about the children. Students flourish in the loving, supportive community that is a hallmark of our school.

Brawerman families are Wilshire Boulevard Temple families, instantly connected to the history and heritage of the Jewish people in Los Angeles. As members of the Temple community, Brawerman families have every aspect of Temple life available to them.

Wilshire Boulevard Temple

One of our country’s most highly respected Reform congregations, Wilshire Boulevard Temple has been responding to the needs of the Los Angeles Jewish community since our founding in 1862 as Congregation B’nai B'rith, the first synagogue in Los Angeles.

Today, Wilshire Boulevard Temple is many things: a center for Jewish spirituality and celebration, a place for lifelong learning and friendship, and an engaged congregation where every person makes a difference. We have two locations to serve our families: our historic Erika J. Glazer Family Campus in Wilshire Center/Koreatown, and our modern Audrey and Sydney Irmas Campus in West Los Angeles. Wilshire Boulevard Temple offers services and worship, adult programs, life cycle events, volunteer and social action opportunities, cultural events, and learning to its members. Many of our cultural activities are open to the wider public.

Early Childhood Centers

The Early Childhood Centers of Wilshire Boulevard Temple are nurturing environments offering Jewish values and education to young children and their families. The primary goals are to develop each child’s self-esteem, promote positive feelings towards learning, and to encourage social interaction within a Jewish setting. The Early Childhood Centers—both NAEYC accredited—build strong bodies, minds, and spirits. Baby & Me classes are offered for babies and toddlers (with parents or grandparents) from birth to 2 1/2 years old. Nursery School is available starting at 18 months to 5 years.

Religious School

Judaism is joyous, the Religious School is both a place of learning and a place of fun and friendship. Through engaging programs, children discover the meaning of Judaism: that there is a purpose to our lives and that each of us has a responsibility to leave the world a better place. Our teaching relies on parents as our partners in living meaningful Jewish lives every day. Religious School is available for Grades K-12. Additionally, youth group programs are available for Grades 3-12.

Camps of Wilshire Boulevard Temple

For more than 60 years, Wilshire Boulevard Temple Camps—Camp Hess Kramer and Gindling Hilltop Camp—have been providing a dynamic and fun environment where campers and staff become part of a community. WBT Camps strive to build a place where everyone is equal and included, supported and cared for, connected and challenged. Wilshire Boulevard Temple Camps provide children a better understanding of their Jewish background while giving them a summer in Malibu they will never forget.

Karsh Center

The Karsh Family Social Service Center offers an array of cross-sector, integrated, and co-located social services. Through the Karsh Center, Wilshire Boulevard Temple and local organizations work together to offer comprehensive resources to the surrounding community in an easily accessible and culturally appropriate manner. The Center seeks to meet the needs of all clients and help them achieve success in their lives, building a stronger community and stronger families in the process.

Tikkun Olam

Tikkun Olam is an integral part of Brawerman West. We know our students will become readers, writers, and mathematicians but the question is what will they do with those skills?

Tikkun Olam offers a natural means to inspire kids to use their newfound skills and abilities for the power of good. Students become problem solvers through a teacher-created, developmentally appropriate, student-centered, progressive curriculum. Students work together to identify problems in the world and then go about developing the means by which to solve those problems.

To date, students have organized a beach cleanup, prepared a meal for Temple staff, collected Halloween candy for the military, and participated in the Temple’s Big Give and Big Sunday volunteer efforts. Students collect recycling on a weekly basis to fund their tikkun olam initiatives.

Parent Association

The overarching goal of Brawerman Elementary School West is to provide students with the best possible educational experience. Research shows that students achieve more when parents and teachers work together. This knowledge forms the basis of our Parent Association, which is very much parent driven and reflects the flavor of our community.

Parents volunteer in classrooms, support classroom and school programming, program community activities, make recommendations to school administration, and work together to create a warm and inviting school community.

Brawerman would not be the school it is without the active participation of Brawerman parents.