N0 > The Lakewood model is not based on Israel.
I am following on YS suggestion. My knowledge of Lakewood is indeed superficial, based on occasional visits there and talking/observing visitors and refugees from there. When I mentioned my “Lakewood Teacher”, he travelled to where I was, not other way around and it was some time ago.
Still, I wonder whether YS has a point here. It seems to be a difference from early small Lakewood where top students did not have general classes with the recent growth of community, with now masses of people ignoring general curriculum. Are all students now at the level of the 1960s when R Malkiel was learning? maybe they are, tell me.