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LINK New York’s Hasidic Jewish schools take public funds but fail to educate kids

For several years now, it’s been an open secret that the religious schools for Hasidic Jews in New York City have deprived students of a quality education. Because of their religious nature, there was also little to no oversight of the curriculum. Boys were expected to become rabbis, so their classes involved a heavy dose of religious indoctrination at the expense of all other classes. Girls received a slightly more well-rounded education, but it was hardly any better.

The only way that sort of training prepares you for the future is if you actually become a rabbi… something that only occurs for about 5% of those boys. The rest? They’re left with no useful knowledge that can set them up for success down the road. That also means they’re effectively locked into their religious bubble for life because stepping outside of it would leave them without most of the requisite skills to make it in the “real world.”

It didn’t help that, for a while when the state’s legislature was roughly split down the middle, conservative State Sen. Simcha Felder (a Democrat who caucuses with Republicans) effectively held the state’s budget hostage unless politicians promised not to interfere with those religious schools. He demanded that yeshivas be exempt from state requirements to give kids a proper education in areas like English, science, math, and history. It made the problem so much worse. ...

snytiger6 9 Sep 12
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5 comments

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1

There was a brief time in my religious past that I consider converting from baptist to jew. Of course they wanted a bunch to "educate me: for that transfer. So, I passed on that. So, glad I did. I'm so glad I have been an Atheist for nearly 5 years.

2

Can the American on here tell me please. How can there be a separation of state and religion, if the state funds religious schools ?

There is a lot i=of disagreement about funding religious schools. It used to be that religious schools received no funding at all from the government. However, three then were court rulings which expanded "religious freedoms" where conservative judges ruled that religious schools should be eligible for some funding. Add into that the "Charter schools" most of which are private schools that receive government funding, which came into existence with the claim that they would provide parents with educational choices for their children, but which mostly only let private schools for the rich start to receive money to subsidize education for rich kids, however, the general public has not yet caught on to that yet.

When charter schools were first started, the demand was so great that the charter schools got to pick which students they would take, and they picked the highest achieving students. Thus when test results came out the charter schools initially had higher test scores. However a few years later, because the school were "for profit" they kept making cuts and cutting corners to save money, and most charter schools fell behind average in test scores. Meanwhile the extra high tuition schools for the rich got more money tht was diverted from public schools, which increased their profits and education quality.

Like I said, most people have not caught on yet that charter schools were mostly a big con. It was developed mostly because after years to trying and failing to sell people on school voucher programs, which also tried (but failed) to sell parents on giving parents educational choices for their kids, it was too easy to figure out that the rich were just trying to get tax payers to subsidize education for rich kids. Charter schools was a new twist of the same thing, which they sold by having pilot programs which picked which students would participate, and they only picked high achievers to begin with, which screwed the results, but managed to sell most of the nation on the program.

Anyway, the charter schools opened the door for the government funding private schools with tax payer money, and so the religious schools sued, saying it was religious discrimination to not fund their schools as well, and some conservative judges agreed. So, that is where we are now.

The net result is the further dumbing down of the U.S.

2

Any parent who decided to send their offspring to a religious based school knows in advance that the curriculum will be stilted and deficient in many topics. It may be their preference to have their child avoid knowledge of science, history, and other cultures or religions. Home schooling can be even worse with parents willfully avoiding topics or ignorant of many topics.

1

Oklahoma's current governor and the Republican candidate for State Superintendent love private schools of any kind. It's obvious their goal is to end public education.

Republicans love for profit schools. Republicans could care less about educating other people's kids unless they can make money from it.

2

At least, unlike the Amish in Pennsylvania, they don’t just end schooling at the eighth grade. And all teachers are apprenticed by other Amish teachers, not state certified. It kind of guarantees a good retention rate when you are shielded from knowledge and choice.

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