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as kids. Their parents do. So if the school is a rotten school and they’re not learning, there’s nothing they can do for themselves. And their parents may or may not care.
Some context, please?
The Wolf
Parents decide most things for kids -what school, what clothes (up to a point), what they eat. If you don’t like it, perhaps you want to convert to being a reptile since baby reptiles usually are allowed to fend for themselves without parental involvement (which is probably why most baby reptiles don’t make it to adulthood). Most reptiles can care for themselves at birth – mammals and birds are dependent on their parents (particularly the mother).
In America, they even decide if the kid will be born. If parents don’t care, that’s a problem. I seriously doubt this is an issue in our community, and parents make very deliberate choices as to what school their children will go to.
Ezra Friedlander is the CEO of The Friedlander Group, a NYC and Washington DC based public policy consulting group.
So we have a PR lobbyist hack telling us not to accept the message due to deficiencies of the messenger.
Kettle, meet pot.
The rebuttal by YAFFED basically says to Ezra (who agrees there needs to be changes) to sit down with them and discuss how changes can be made.
End story, Ezra can spin however he wants. After all, that is what he was paid to do.
I don’t blame Friedlander or anyone else for not wanting to meet with this OTD guy whose sole motivation is to malign the frum community.
I don’t blame Friedlander or anyone else for not wanting to meet with this OTD guy whose sole motivation is to malign the frum community
As a PR hack lobbyist, I’m sure Ezra has met with much worse. Besides, he’s not being paid to meet with the OTD guy.
or anyone else
But Ezra is included, as he is the main subject. My comments apply to him (the “bad messenger”). I’ll agree that someone who is is not in the PR business has no reason to speak with these guys.
🙂
Its not true yeshivas dont get government money and that they are unregulated.
In NY private and parochial schools ARE regulated, they are required to teach certain core classes.
While yeshivas cannot get direct money, they can get indirect money meaning things like bussing, books, Tax breaks for the building ability to pay the rebbeim tax free (parsanage) money for pools and other parts of the building as well
edited to make it easier for nisht to read
ZD,
There are so many things wrong with your post that you must have done so intentionally.
Books about kissing?
Tax breaks have nothing do with schooling, rather that as a an exempt organization they do not have to pay.
Same with parsonage allowance, it is clearly not for the portion the government would have anything to do with, because of the separation of religion and state.
And parsonage is not just for schools. And there is still SECA.
What money for pools or build (sic).
Where on this earth did you come up with this stuff?
Gavra, what do you have against PR people?
Yeshivas don’t get money for busing. The state mandates that students living 2 miles away in elementary & 2.5 mile away in high school must be provided with school busing by the Board of Ed. This mandated busing applies in both NY & NJ. They do get grants (which are like money) for text books, security systems, furniture to name a few things. As far as tax breaks for yeshiva they are a nonprofit org. and these tax break are based on IRS regulations.
As far as NY regulating Yeshivas while technically your correct they have never really enforced core curriculum in the yeshivas so to some extent they are unregulated.
It depends if the Yeshiva is an Accredited School. If so, they have to adhere to a core curriculum, though it doesn’t necessarily mean they do a good job of it.
NY Yeshivas get more Bd of Ed services than most other cities.
Also, public school student have to go to their area designated schools unless they get special permission otherwise.
Gavra, what do you have against PR people?
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Whose opinion is Ezra writing, and how much did he get paid for it?
in the eastern coast, theres a town where you must apply to at least 3 schools of the town for your child & THE OWNERS OF THE SCHOOLS decide which children should go where. parents don’t have any say cause if they try to put their say in then there wont be any school accepting their child. CRAZY CORRUPT SYSTEM
Who should get to decide?
Gavra, apparently for the frum schools. Why can’t the frum schools hire someone to be their spokesman?
Gavra, apparently for the frum schools. Why can’t the frum schools hire someone to be their spokesman?
Or YAFFED, who wants the Chassidim to fight. Or the Catholic schools, who also don’t want an investigation. Or DeBlasio, who wants the whole thing to go away. Or someone else.
Any way you look at it, a PR person will say whatever he gets paid to say and has no credibility in his words. So I’ll choose (and others can choose otherwise) to dismiss the words of a paid spokesman as a “bad messenger”, just like his paid-for “piece” (which is not an “opinion”, as his opinion is “show me the money”).
If he were honest, he would disclose whose opinion it was. If he were really honest, he would disclose how much he got paid to write this.
That’s ridiculous. There’s no dishonesty here. You are not heeding your subtitle.
BTW, what’s your annual income?
DaasYochid – shaychus? I write for myself. This guy is writing for someone else (whom, we don’t know. It may be someone with evil intent towards our community).
What business is it of yours (or mine) what he gets paid?
Just like public reviewers of products have to disclose that they got paid for the review. Madach if he took money that may influence an opinion he has to disclose it, Kol Shekein if he only has the “opinion” because he was paid he has to disclose it.
To Ezra’s credit though, one can argue that everyone knows he has no opinion of his own (since he is a PR hack) and there is no need to explicitly disclose that he got paid to write a piece to try and convince others.
GAW,
That’s so very kind of you. Not sure why you are so sure that your opinions are any more original than his are?
GAW,
That’s so very kind of you.
Thanks, I agree.
Have a good Shabbos 🙂
To answer your question, have “you” ever read Descartes?
Am I the only person who just thought that his essay said little worth repeating, let alone worth arguing?
He spoke vapidly about mesorah with little to nothing to back it up or even explain its relevance.
If Friedlander has even read Moster’s mission statement, he would know that (at least Moster claims) that he has parents on his side who are frightened that their community standing will be ruined and their children kicked out of school if they say anything- in direct contrast to his argument.
In fact, according to this argument, the only logical course of action for him personally is to rise up and start a grassroots movement to change the secular studies quality in the schools, isn’t it? He’s the one whose entire argument is based on the fact that Moster is the wrong person to tackle the issue and not that the issue is invalid.
Does he really think more funding will help? I and most people I know attended Jewish schools across many parts of the spectrum with adequate (at the very least) secular studies who have probably less funding than these schools have. Other schools manage it- if these schools want to, they can too.
He also shows himself to know little about the closing of the Volozhin yeshiva (as a poster on the article mentioned)- Volozhin was a yeshiva with students who were well educated and the particular restrictions posed by the Czarist government were far more draconian than simply adding secular studies- it would essentially turn the school into a college with practically no Jewish studies allowed at all. (Yes, I read My Uncle The Netziv.)
Look, blame the messenger, I really don’t care. But if you do, then come up with your own better solution instead of writing a beige article which says nothing but quoting old meaningless talking points.
Moser is not needed by the parents. The parents could choose to send their child to another school with different secular studies standards, if they chose to, without resorting to Monster.
The parents specifically chose a yeshiva with a high level of Talmudical studies and a low level of scientific studies rather than a school with a lower level of Talmudical studies and a higher level of scientific studies.
Joseph: maybe parents want to remain part of their community but have also the skills to succeed in the secular world.
So the parents can either suck it up because their schools will stay the way they are (probably illegally) or send to other schools and be branded tuna beigels…
…or at least that’s how it works here in Monsey.
ETA: Plus, there are plenty of schools that have excellent Torah studies without stinting (okay, without stinting TOO MUCH) on the secular studies. They just don’t teach in Yiddish, if that’s a problem. It really, REALLY can be done…
Writer soul
I sent my sons to YTV and Mir both with at least to me the Secular Department was competent. I didn’t realize that they were low level of Talmudic studies. Every year student switch from one yeshiva to the next so I don’t see why it was necessary to report the yeshiva to the Dept of Education.
Closing Yeshivas should not be done because where would the students go? But likewise there is a limit what the government can do. There is the separation of church & state. The only thing they can do is encourage the yeshiva to teach more secular studies by giving them more benefits (money). But once they give more money to these yeshivas it will encourage other yeshivas who are meeting the standards to apply for these benefit too. Nobody want the Board of Ed ( Dept of Education)to be paying students tuition for the parents. That’s were we are heading. If they want to dictate the curriculum they should have to pay for it.
A big (and obvious) rule of thumb is that the more time allocated to secular studies, the more time detracted from Torah studies – and thus the lower the quantity of Torah material possible.
Quantity matters.
Moser alleges he has parents who are afraid to say things. But I doubt anything he says.
If he did not know what a cell is, it’s not the schools. Because any of the chasidim I know know that type of basic stuff.
But this fellow clearly has serious issues. And its easier to blame others than to take personal responsibility.
Mir & YTV both have English from 3-6 PM and the students take the regents. There are probably more yeshiva who have just as good secular education program but these yeshivas were where my sons went to.The parents have to take charge. The government can’t do everything.
Joe, I don’t think that’s true. Quantity might give more potential for quality but there is no guarantee of greater quality- I wouldn’t call it a “rule of thumb” in a practical sense. It depends more on what you do with your time, how skilled the teachers are… so many more factors than simply the amount of time allotted.
Purely anecdotal, but I’ve known people to switch their sons from more yeshivish elementary schools with very little secular studies to schools which emphasize secular studies more and then need to get their sons tutors for BOTH Judaic and secular studies so that they can keep up in their new yeshivas. And these are smart kids.
Abba_S: I know people who went to YTV 40+ years ago and by the sound of it the secular studies are very nearly better now than they were back then :).
As far as the separation between church and state- that is one of Ezra Friedlander’s big, BIG inconsistencies. On the one hand, he doesn’t want an audit or review in any way of the yeshivas out of fear that they will be dictated to by the government- on the other hand, he wants some kind of free, no-strings-attached handout gift-wrapped and handed over from that same government. That’s simply not how life works and, to be honest, it’s better that way.
Everyone complains about how the government in Israel tries to mess with the schools, and they can, because they’re governmentally supported. The tuition-based financing of our schools has led for a lot of autonomy that we might not necessarily have otherwise- look at UPK in frum schools and how it means that kids in preschool may not legally be allowed to learn the brachos for their lunch food. There seems to be a culture of “magiah li” which makes people think that money can/should come with no consequences. Let him make a cheshbon- would he rather get government money and have his kids’ schools teach about families with two tatties or would he rather get on his hands and knees and work for change for his kids’ schools himself, as seems to be the only conclusion possible to come to after reading his own article?
1) All things equal, the more quantity given to Torah studies, the greater the possible quality of Torah studies.
2) Even putting aside the debate on quality, a higher quantity of Limud Torah is in its own right a major plus. There is no minimum threshold for the amount of Torah you are obligated to know. The rule is: more is better; less is worse. And the difference between just a little more and a little less is staggering. As the Vilna Gaon points out, one word of Torah knowledge gives you more holiness than an entire lifetime’s worth of doing other Mitzvos.
And here we thought that a secular education is expensive! Its much more expensive than you think – you can acquire it only at the expense of your time and effort that you could have been putting toward becoming educated in Olam Habah.
that is one of Ezra Friedlander’s big, BIG inconsistencies. On the one hand, he doesn’t want an audit or review in any way of the yeshivas out of fear that they will be dictated to by the government- on the other hand, he wants some kind of free, no-strings-attached handout gift-wrapped and handed over from that same government. That’s simply not how life works and, to be honest, it’s better that way.
There is no need for government socialized education. Let government get out of the education business and allow the private sector to operate schools. Government has proven itself a failure in education. Public school students are far behind not only private school students but far behind international educational benchmarks.
And we have every right to expect government funding of our children so long as we are subjected to taxation that finances schooling.
writersoul
The point I am trying to make is it’s the parent’s job to choose a yeshiva for their child that will provide him with the skills to succeed in life. I made it my business to meet the teachers both in Hebrew & English to see how my kids were doing each and every time there was a parent teacher meeting. I also saw every report card and test, so I was able to judge if he was learning at grade level.
I don’t want the yeshivas to get additional aid, rather give the parents a tax deduction or maybe a tax credit for tuition paid to yeshivas for elementary & mesivtas.
Joe: “all things equal”- it rarely is, is it?
Look, there are already schools that say what you do and focus more on limudei kodesh. No contest. All I’m saying is that there is no obvious, constant correlation between time spent on limudei kodhesh and its quality.
And as far as funding goes- I’m from Monsey, where families are taxed through the roof to pay for a failing public school system. I know what you mean. But it’s the principle behind basically everything in life- he who pays the fiddler calls the tune. Right now we have a system where there is public school available to those who want it and private school for those who have other wants or needs. Taxation at this point finances the public schooling which everyone is entitled to and, in some cases, benefits for private schools as well (all my years of in-county school, I received public bussing and textbooks). Besides, a really big part of the issue here is the separation between church and state, which, regardless of what various frum columnists have written recently, is still pretty darn important, considering some of what I wrote above.
And Joe, a random question (if it’s prying, feel free not to answer)- you’re very articulate, and you’ve talked in other threads of being literacy teacher or something similar, I forget. Do you not want kids to have the same skills you do? Many are unable to achieve that because of their schools, and it’s not easy to teach such things to yourself. How did you achieve your level of articulacy? If it is in fact self taught, I salute you, but I wouldn’t guess that offhand.
Abba_S: “I don’t want the yeshivas to get additional aid, rather give the parents a tax deduction or maybe a tax credit for tuition paid to yeshivas for elementary & mesivtas.”
That’s a separate question, rather it’s related to Joe’s thing about taxes and the voucher issue in some states.
Yes, parents do choose their children’s schools, but as the OP pointed out, kids can end up messed up by their parents’ choices (and yes, that’s normal, but this seems something basic enough that it should be avoided), and as I mentioned upstream, there aren’t always options depending on the community. People wishing to remain part of their communities can’t always make the decisions they’d like to make. My siblings went to school with several children of chassidim who sent their kids to schools where they could get a better education and then felt alienated from their kehillos as a result. Working to change attitudes about limudei chol (because that’s also a big thing- the kids are taught not to care about them, and therefore even the tiny amount of time allocated for them can be wasted) from the inside out can stop people from facing this sort of a choice.
writer, you missed the point. It doesn’t necessarily have to be equal. A greater quantity of Torah is always better than a lesser quantity of Torah.
The frum community are part of those who pay (i.e. taxpayers) the fiddler. Church/State is not a barrier to funding private schools; other States do it and have won Church/State lawsuits upholding the government’s ability to fund such institutions.
My education is fully through the normative chrareidi education system; anything else is self-taught.
Writer
The government getting involved is just complicating the matter. I realize there is peer pressure on the parents to send their child to a certain type of yeshiva. But are you saying that all these people are in a cult and randomly give up their children’s future just so they will fit in.
I think they need to have a kiruv program. Just like there is a kiruv program for the non Orthodox. There should be a kiruv program where say on Shobbos or Sunday. Students from traditional yeshivas with a secular department learn with the students that don’t have secular education. Maybe even having learning contests with the parent attending. This will expose both the students and the parents to the concept that you can have a secular education and still be a Talmud Chocham. May of today’s Gedolim had secular education. I believe even the Satmar Rav, R’ Ahron had it.
The problem is the welfare state that we live in doesn’t really encourage productivity. In minority neighborhoods you have generation after generation on the dole. This is happening in our community too. It has to be, that going on government programs is look down upon. Otherwise why learn secular studies they are never going to have a job.
A critical chiluk that y’all are missing is that most yeshivos (even what Joe calls “Charaidi”, which they most certainly are not) are not an issue, including YTV & Chaim Berlin, or even Riverdale and Philly. It is only a small number of yeshivos (which from Ezra being the PR guy, I would imagine strongly Chassidic) that don’t teach the minimum requirements, and there are questions if they can continue to get funds such as books, bussing, and attendance. In addition, students may be required to independently verify that they understand required material, similar to homeschooled children.
So when you all bring in your own experiences, they aren’t relevant to the article or discussion.
Joseph
Back in the 1800 when the Irish who were mostly Roman Catholic, were coming over to NY, the Protestants who were the majority wrote in to the state constitution stronger language to separate church and state. So basically the state constitution has to be changed. The teachers union and other union whose member work in the schools know if school choices was ever available,it would be the end of public schools,their member’s job and their job at the union too. So they fight any type of funding for private education.
Right now the Democrats control both the assembly, the senate (all though some of the Democrats voted for a Republican leadership so technically the Republicans are in charge)and the governor is a Democrat. Nothing is going to be passed by all three bodies without the teacher’s union approval.
Joseph, be careful what you wish for, as you may actually get it.
Orthodox Jews were able to run for school board positions because they made the valid argument that as taxpayers, they were entitled to a say on how tax payer money was spent.
Well, yeshivas were ever funded by government, how do you keep taxpayers from having a say on how they are run?
Abba, the Republicans won enough seats last year to control the NY Senate outright
By enacting a law funding private schools to run their educational system how they choose, without socialized government bureaucrats determining what is best from an educational standpoint. We’ve seen how government-run education has failed public school students for over half a century.
The logic is simple, taxpayers should choose how to educate their children without government interference. And taxpayers should choose where to educate their children, and receive the same educational funding that they paid taxes for regardless of where they send their children to school.
Less Chumras
You are correct that for the 2015 term they won enough seats to control the senate but just barely. They won 32 out of 63 seats and currently have 31 seats so they need the Democrats. Even with the one vote majority it’s hard to pass anything without Democratic support. The Democrats are controlled by the unions who are against any support for non-public education, that is basically what is blocking it.
Once the government starts paying for the children’s education they will want to micro managing what is taught and how much is taught. This is already happening in regards to pre-k. We don’t need it. A better solution is to grant tax credits for education. The parent or relative will get a tax credit on their income tax for tuition payments. The taxpayer will be subsidizing yeshiva education indirectly and not have the power to micro manage the yeshivas, just like than any other tax credit program.
Joseph, you ignored my question. If taxpayer money is being used, andcfrum taxpayers have a right to sit on boards of education,that determine how money is spent on public schools, how do you you deny non Jews the same right when it comes to yeshivas?
lc: Taxpayers have a right to sit on a public board of ed that pays for educational services for taxpayers children. The public board of ed controls spending for services for both public and private schools. The taxpayers right to sit on the board is because it is a public government body. If the board of ed only determines public school funding and stops determining private school services with the latter determined by another entity, and private schools were government funded, then it would be more logical to limit participation on the board of ed to public school parents.
Taxpayers do not have a right, nor should they have a right, to determine how private schools spend money to educate children, even if partially tax funded. The school is a private entity not a government body. Only the parents and private school should determine their educational curriculum, and how they choose to spend their educational dollars, as government bureaucrats shouldn’t be replacing parents in determining how to educate the children.
And tax dollars should pay for children’s education regardless of where they go to school, public or private, because parents pay school education taxes and parents should decide where to send their children without government interference into how they choose to educate their children.
In fact, there is good reason to disband public schools and privatize them, considering the government’s proven failure in educating children in public schools. The government does not belong in the school business.
Less,
Silly comparison. The school boards are not deciding what can and cannot be taught. They are responsible for the budget. At issue is which Extra curricular and non mandated items will be paid by the school board.
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