One of the late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks recurring urgent messages to the Jewish people wherever he met us, across the wide expanse of his much-traveled horizons, was: “If you want to save the Jewish future, you have to build Jewish day schools. There is no other way.”
He never shied away from confidently, yet humbly, without any hesitation or doubt, sharing this keystone Jewish and personal belief with his audiences.
It is against the permanent relevance of Rabbi Sacks’ tribute to education that we call attention to a recent announcement by Daniel Held, Chief Program Officer, UJA Federation of Greater Toronto.
UJA Federation has introduced a new Day School Scholarships website “to help more children and youth access a day school education.” They revised the Day School Scholarships application system “to make it easier” to access. Applications are now open for all Day School Scholarships for the 2023’24 school year.
Held pointed out that day school enrollment has grown for a third straight year.
GAJE is confident that the increase in enrollment stems from recent funding initiatives by the UJA Federation aimed at trying to make school tuition more affordable for young families. There is indeed a direct correlation between level of tuition and level of enrollment. In addition, we note the special efforts of Jewish day schools steering through the pandemic with innovation, commitment and excellence, in a manner that most of the public schools did not or could not. Many parents took note of this as well and opted to enrol their children in day school.
The Day School Scholarships website can be accessed at:
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Important announcement for parents
The Ministry of Education announced a program of direct one-time distribution of either $200 or $250 to parents for each child to help with the costs of their children’s tutoring, supplies or equipment during the 2022–23 school year. The deadline to apply is 11:59 EST on March 31.
Unlike the distribution last year of the federal Covid safety funds for a safe return to school, Queen’s Park decided to make children in “private” schools eligible for the grant.
The application process and eligibility criteria are available at:
https://www.ontario.ca/page/catch-up-payments
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If you wish to contribute to GAJE’s lawsuit for fairness in educational funding, please click here.
For further information, please contact Israel Mida at: imida1818@gmail.com
Charitable receipts for donations for income tax purposes will be issued by Mizrachi Canada. Your donations will be used for the sole purpose of underwriting the costs of the lawsuit.
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Shabbat shalom.
Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)
October 28, 2022
Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education 