The New York State Board of Regents has tried for years to enforce a state law requiring orthodox Jewish religious schools to teach core subjects in English. Yeshiva graduates have complained that their education in Yiddish and Hebrew left them unequipped to function in the modern world.
Despite the state law, a Brooklyn Yeshiva decided to drop the only secular subject taught in eighth grade.
A Hasidic Jewish school in Brooklyn recently notified parents that it will stop teaching secular studies to eighth graders, even though state law requires such classes, according to a new complaint filed by an education advocacy group.
Yeshiva Talmud Torah Ohr Moshe, on the outskirts of Borough Park, sent a letter to parents last month stating that it would replace its middle schoolers’ nonreligious study course with a class on practical laws of the sabbath observance.
The change was made in response to requests from parents, according to the letter in Hebrew obtained by THE CITY.
Before the switch, the school only offered students 45 minutes of secular education per day, according to Yaffed (Young Advocates for Fair Education), the advocacy group that reported the school to city investigators…
The latest complaint from Yaffed to city education officials comes seven years after the group’s initial grievance against close to 40 schools triggered a review by the city Department of Education — an investigation school officials claim is ongoing.
Yaffed and other advocates contend thousands of Hasidic boys get little, if any, basic secular education in religious schools. That includes traditional math, language and science classes.
Some students struggle to speak and read and write English when they graduate from high school, according to accounts from graduates.
Mayors Play Dumb
Mayor Eric Adams has said little lately about the ongoing issue and advocates are urging him to take a more aggressive approach.
The former Brooklyn borough president was endorsed by many Hasidic leaders in the general election for mayor, with some citing his statements supporting them in the face of the drawn-out investigation into their schools.
On the campaign trail, Adams visited an unnamed Brooklyn yeshiva and praised its curriculum.
”I was really impressed by what I saw,” Adams told the Forward last March. “Watching those children understand grammar, understand English, saying they like writing and reading, it was amazing.”
Yes, it is amazing to see children understanding grammar and English when their school instruction is solely in Yiddish or Hebrew.
He noted that the school was among 28 being investigated at the time by city officials but refused to name the school…
In December 2019, the Department of Investigation released a report stating that former Mayor Bill de Blasio had been aware that the investigation was purposely delayed, in part to help him gain support in Albany for an extension of mayoral control of schools.
The report said City Hall engaged in “political horse trading” with state politicians by holding back the yeshiva report in a bid to maintain power over the education system.
Shortly after that, former Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza made public his letter to the state Department of Education explaining what his agency had found: 26 of 28 of the yeshivas named in the original complaint were still not in compliance with state education requirements.
DOE investigators found little or no evidence of secular classes at two of the three high schools they checked since August 2018…
The yeshivas have long pushed back on any meaningful oversight and insist that they are in compliance with state law. At the same time, they’ve argued that education officials should be more concerned with struggling public schools and lobbied elected officials to try to change the law requiring all students to receive a basic secular education.
Why don’t city and state officials require Yeshivas to obey state law and teach their students in English for a meaningful part of the day? Politics. There are a large number of Orthodox Jews of many different sects in New York City and State. They vote as a bloc, and they vote their self-interest. Candidates for city, state, and federal offices court their endorsement.
The Yeshivas receive millions of dollars in state and federal funds. New York Governor Kathy Hochul, who is running for office, added $295 million for non-public schools in her proposed budget. Many more millions pay for using, security guards, and COVID-related costs.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
You say Yiddish, Adams says English
Adams says Yeshivas, You say Mischievous
Yiddish, English, Yeshivas, Mischievous
Let’s call the whole investigation off.
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Thanks for the laugh, SDP!
A well-beyond ridiculous situation, which calls for an “oy vey iss meir,” Yiddish for REALLY bad.
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This is amazingly beyond any possible logical reason. Who will be the ones suffering in the long run for these Jewish Orthodox schools not teaching secular subject such as English. It is will be the students not the Orthodox leadership.
These students, as it was stated, will not even have the basic skills to go out an find a meaningful job. These students will be forced to end up living and working in the Orthodox Jewish communities with little hope of moving out in the the board world in which we live. It will be difficult, not impossible, for these students to be prepared to attend any major college or university.
The Jewish Orthodox leadership is building a fence around their children so that they, the children, remain totally dependent upon the Orthodox community for the rest of their lives.
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Unfortunately, some of the voucher students in Christian schools with questionable academics may find themselves equally unprepared for the real world.
New York Democrats are reluctant to enforce laws in the Hasidic community. They tend to vote for Democrats, and they vote in a block. New York Democrats tend to ignore any problems unless they become so significant, they can no longer be ignored.
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I guess getting elected to a governmental position is more important than the health, welfare, and future of these children.
Seems to me that this is a form of child abuse and should be treated as such.
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In 2020, the Diocese of Brooklyn opened the St. Thomas Aquinas Distance Learning School with 2,000 K-8 students.
Catholic Virtual.com which has “Catholic-trained teachers” reported an uptick in interest in its product.
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The Orthodox community abide by their Rebbes positions when it comes to voting–the men do that is; then they tell their wives who to vote for. Unlike more mainstream Jewish individuals who tend to vote Democrat, the Orthodox (like other American religious fundamentalists) favor conservative positions such as those which Republicans hold. Think school vouchers. Think unquestioningly pro-Israel.
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The Orthodox community was rabidly pro-Trump because of vouchers.
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citoyenne
Bingo
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Could it be that the Orthodox community wants just that? They want to keep their students in their community and not out in the real world.
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on the nose
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of course, these folks would say “in the unreal world”
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Absolutely.
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A little preview of education in the fundamentalist Christian madrassas we’ll have all over the country once the Repugnicans control all three branches of government come 2025. Can’t wait for that new national curriculum!
Part 1: Bringing Jesus to the Savages
Part 2: Life on the Plantation: Old Black Joe Loved It!
Part 3: Manifest Destiny, aka Lebensraum
Part 4: The War of Northern Aggression (How the Lost Cause Lived On)
Part 4: Offenses to Southern Womanhood: Northern Liberal Carpetbaggers Ravage the South
Part 5: Immigrant Rapists and Murderers Flood In
Part 6: World War 1: How War Stimulates the Economy (a Case Study)
Part 7: World War 2: The US Takes the Wrong Side
Part 8: Ronnie Whips the Commies
Part 9: The Rise of Dimocrat Babylon
Part 10: The Coming of Glorious Leader Who Shone More Orange Than Does the Sun
Part 11: The American Revolution of 2022-24 and the Second Civil War
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Madrassa simply means school in Arabic. Madrassas can be religious or secular. Stop the prejudice of conflating the Arabic word for school with extremism.
I can speak rudimentary Arabic, while my Palestinian husband is fluent. Do you speak Arabic? Obviously not.
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https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/madrassa
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https://www.brookings.edu/research/pakistans-madrassahs-ensuring-a-system-of-education-not-jihad/
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We have traditionally not had, since colonial days, religious public schools in the United States. I use the term because bizarrely, Republicans in the U.S. have enormous prejudice AGAINST Islamic fundamentalist religious schools but enormous support FOR Christian fundamentalist religious schools. So, I use the term to point out the hypocrisy.
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I regret to inform you that here in the South we have had borderline Christian public schools for decades. My father was an Episcopal priest who loathed the inclusion of bible when I was in elementary school in the 1960’s. First, because it went against the concept of separation of church and state and second, because the evangelical perspective was, to our tradition, let’s just say, errant. My siblings and I were the only ones who were sent to the library when the Bible teacher arrived in the class. It didn’t bother me because it simply allowed the opportunity to read about dinosaurs (ah, the evolutionary irony!) As I taught and administered through my own education career many in the schools began practices of prayer around the flag pole and at various school functions. The recent SCOTUS ruling so cynically propped up by contemporary right wing zealots, is not uncommon in my neck of the woods. I frequently witnessed other athletic coaches lead off with the Lords Prayer before going into competition. Would it be to hyperbolic to say “off to war”? For those of us who remain believers and adhere to the requirement of freedom from religion, we just go about our merry way while hoping the fever will break.
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My work for educational publishers took me to schools all around the country. I was at a high school in Georgia–a public high school–that hauled off every morning with a prayer over the PA system that ended with “in Jesus’s name we pray.”
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And what a wonderful story, Paul! Thank you for sharing it. Love the image in my mind of the young Paul, on principle, sitting in a library reading about dinos!
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https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/saudi/analyses/madrassas.html
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The Extreme Court in the United States is clearing the way for taxpayer funding of religious schools in order to create vehicles for indoctrination of a new generation of kids in fundamentalist, nationalist Christian ideology (see, for example, the Hillsdale 1775 curriculum), just as extremist traditionalists in Saudi Arabia funded the training of extremists in religious schools, madrassas, all over the Middle East and beyond. Why is the Extreme Court doing this? Because educated Republicans can see from polls and from the culture at large that the youth and the cultural avant-garde are against them ON EVERY ISSUE. So, they want to create a mechanism for turning that back, and religious schoolings is such a mechanism. Institutions for indoctrination.
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In “The Battle for God” by Karen Armstrong, I learned that Fundamentalism is a cancer that exists in all faiths. In Yuval Harari”s “Sapiens,” I learned that our addiction to myth is an existential threat. Stay tuned…
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Can I have an Amen up in here! Yes and yes.
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Nearly all of the NYS funding available to nonpublic schools is based on following Regents standards, pupil testing/ evaluation, etc. This school (and 2/3 of other yeshivas investigated in the last 3 yrs) are apparently issuing state-accredited hisch diplomas without teaching even the bare bones required for accreditation.
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Fundamentalism has been a historically recent phenomenon. According to History.com Orthodox Judaism began in the 18th Century. Fundamentalist Christianity and Islam grew in the 20th century in response to the modernization brought about by the industrial revolution. Even the current vitriol coming out of some circles of the atheist community have a similar tone. Listened to Bill Maher lately? He blames our world’s struggles on Millennials. Most reactionary conservative movements act to build walls to insure survival. The problem is that history teaches us that every time humans build castles, they eventually fall.
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Christopher Rufo’s interview posted at Pat Buchanan’s site makes the link between the marriage of GOP activism and Christian conservative religions i.e. Catholic and evangelical protestants.
Axios posted a good analysis recently, “The Making of the Modern Republican”. The article identifies Fox as pivotal. The network’s major on-air hosts, excluding Tucker Carlson, identify themselves as being driven by their religion e.g. Laura Ingraham.
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Correction- Ryan Girdusky’s interview.
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The Social Gospel movement in the mid 1900’s is responsible for the New Deal Legislation.
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Fundamentalism is not a general description of religion, but none subset that confronts a changing world by denying that change. The Civil Rights movement for example is not a fundamentalist movement but one of liberation theology that focuses on human inclusivity.
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I would say that the Depression was responsible for the New Deal Legislation, LOL. But this movement is fascinating nonetheless, as are so many left-wing, anti-authoritarian Christian utopian movements and organizations throughout history: the Cathars, the Brethren of the Free Spirit, the Luddites, the Diggers, the Levelers, the Adamites, New Harmony, etc. So moving and beautiful–all these attempts at rising up against oppression!
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In a 2020 article by the Manhattan Institute (Koch) about Yeshivas, the author wrote, “An education system that only sought to transmit knowledge would not succeed in deterring crimes.” Religion, misused, is the training ground to prevent opposition to the barbaric acts of the powerful. Ireland, during the Great Hunger when 1,000,000 Irish died, is an example. Six million Jews died in the Holocaust. The death toll was only stopped by those outside of Germany. Who’s going to stop the powerful and ruthless in the U.S.?
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Only voters can do this. In the 2022 Midterms.
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In other news, Michael Avenatti was convicted for stealing from Stormy Daniels. He’s not Donald Trump, so he was actually arrested, tried, and convicted for his crime.
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Excellent point, Bob.
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Separation. Of. Church. And. State.
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Josh Mandel is likely to replace Sen. Portman of Ohio. He said he doesn’t believe in separation of church and state. He holds a Bible in one hand and the Constitution in the other when he visits evangelical churches to get votes. His opponent made a point of telling evangelicals that Mandel is Jewish. Christian nationalism may appeal to Mandel today but, not so much in the future.
Portman who votes along party lines will be replaced with someone who pulls the party to the right- so, probably not much difference.
People with influence in D.C., like Susan Rice, seem to get quite rich whether in office or not. I’m sure Portman will increase his wealth.
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Mandel is a disgrace.
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Tired of all this wokey hokey pokey from the Libtard Dimocrats? Sick of Socialists teachers pushing your kids to be transgender? Had it with science and SJWs and JSLs (Jewish space lasers), with caravans of immigrants poisoning the drinking water, and CRT misplacing the remote, sleeping with your boy’s wife, and God knows what else?
Then enroll your students in Bob n Darlene’s Real Good Flor-uh-duh School, where we teach real HIStory (Can I have a Hallelujah?) and have 100 percent genuine American and Medieval values! Bob n Darlene’s, whar you will know yore little darlins’ll be safe because ALL are teachers is locked and loaded!
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What part of, Pirkei Avot 4:5 don’t they get?
It explicitly condemns the use of Torah as a means to earn a living of for self-aggrandizement.
The relevant quote is:
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Thank you, Matthew.
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Searched “Hasidic” to see if you wrote about the recent headline in the NYT that says NYC yeshivas have received over a $1B in four years. With no need to account for anything or show high standardized test scores. A billion dollars that could have gone to public schools. This should be a crime, but in this climate, it’s not even a disgrace.
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I am going on 80. I was raised in the Christian faith and still believe in the tenants of the faith.
Raised in Kansas. A very conserved state. Attended public schools all the way through high school. NEVER once did we pray in any classroom. NEVER did we have prayer before any athletic event. NEVER did we pray around the flag pole.
I am really getting tired of all these religions zealots who want to force their beliefs on others — regardless of what religious faith it maybe. One of the founding principals this country was/is the separation of church and state. That principal was established for very good reasons by the founding fathers of this country.
It is getting to the point I do not want to have anything to do with any organized religion. My wife and I attended church almost every Sunday and some other days. Done so for 54 years. Not now. We have stopped going. With what is going on in this country makes going to an organized church is meaningless. We are better off going out into the local mountains and communing with nature.
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I went to public school in Texas in the 1950s. Every day started with a prayer.
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Apparently praying every day in Texas was good for you but did not do much to improve how some people live, thinking act in Texas. Abbott is a perfect example.
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