Hebrew Charter Schools: Part of the Solution to the Education Crisis?

In the UK, where I was brought up and worked as a rabbi for a number of years, Jewish education is straightforward. One of the largest government-funded high schools in the UK is Jewish and there are well over twenty government-funded Jewish primary schools in London alone. So for many parents the question is not whether to send their children to a Jewish school, but which Jewish school they should send them to. In addition, because the government funds faith schools, the cost of sending a child to a Jewish school is not a consideration.

In the United States it is another story altogether. Because of the separation of Church and State enshrined into the Constitution, the government is not allowed to fund a single faith school. All Jewish schools must be privately funded from tuition paid by parents or by fundraising efforts. Many parents either cannot afford to send their children to a Jewish day school at all or it just does not make the priority list for their after-tax dollars. The result is that most Jewish children do not get a decent Jewish education, Jewish identity suffers and assimilation grows.

According to some estimates, privately funding Jewish day school education for fifty percent of Jewish children in the United States would run into billions of dollars annually and it is therefore unrealistic to expect that even this half-measure will happen. Over the last few years, however, an alternative has emerged: Hebrew charter schools. A charter school is one that is run like a private school but is funded by the government. The first such Hebrew language school was Ben Gamla Charter School, which opened in Broward County, Florida, last year.

Funded in part by philanthropist Michael Steinhardt and directed by his daughter Sara Berman, the second Hebrew charter school is set to open in the next year or so in New York City. Although Mrs. Berman maintains that the school she is planning has absolutely no religious agenda and that it is a purely educational and academic enterprise, the concept could be part of the solution to the problem Jewish education faces in this country.

As Sara Berman explained to me, there is a precedent for language-based charter schools. In Pasco County, Florida, there is the Athenian Academy and in New York City there is the Hellenic Classical Charter School, both of which offer Greek language immersion and the latter actually teaches Greek culture and heritage as well.

'The goal is academic excellence'

Setting up a charter school that offers Hebrew language immersion together with Jewish culture and heritage seems like a great idea. There is only one major drawback: Religion must be taught in an academic and secular manner. As Sara Berman explains, “If you’re studying French, you will learn about going to the boulangerie to pick up a baguette.

You’ll imagine yourself in Paris. Here, you’ll learn there is a place called Israel. And this is what secular life is like there.” But she concludes that, “The goal is academic excellence and kids fluent in Hebrew, not to teach Jewish students per se or to shore up Jewish identity.” Certainly this has to be the case as long as funding is coming from the State – doing otherwise would be illegal.

Notwithstanding, there is still something very valuable about teaching Jewish children Hebrew even if it is not accompanied by teaching them religion. Lack of knowledge of Hebrew is one of the most significant barriers to religious Jewish participation. Clearly, for the students of Steinhardt’s new Hebrew language immersion charter school this barrier will be removed, making it much easier for them to enter the religious life of Judaism in the future.

There is, however, one other ingredient that would complete the model. Many states have what is known as a released time law, which mandates that public schools release students from school for religious instruction during the school day itself. So we could have Hebrew charter schools that teach Hebrew, Jewish heritage and culture and for one hour a day students would go to an adjacent, privately funded building to study the religion of Judaism, including classical texts of Chumash and Talmud. If this were possible, we might have found a far less expensive and more practical solution to the current Jewish day school education dilemma that United States Jewry faces

Rabbi Levi Brackman  is executive director of Judaism in the Foothills . His upcoming book, "Jewish Wisdom for Business Success", is set to be published in late 2008.