The “other” calendar year is now winding down. Two Fridays remain in 2021. Once again, we must find our resolve to “lift” ourselves to ward off – as much as we are able – the harm from the ever evolving, oppressive pandemic. Who would have thought that we now begin a third year under Covid’s shadow? Let us not lose our way, our strength, or our goodness to do what must be done to protect as many people as our hearts can reach.

In seeking that strength and resolve, there is no better source for the energy we need to sustain us on an ongoing basis than in the first principles of Jewish education whose essential task is the transmission – across all time – of the “manual” of a meaningful Jewish life that of course includes caring for the betterment of all humankind.

The clear-eyed, thoughtful insights of Rabbi Marc D. Angel, the founder of the New York-based Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals can help us. Some of the nuggets from his commentary on the two preceding Torah portions, can serve as guideposts to help us navigate through our many modern distresses, and to help us find the strength that comes from knowing who we are.

• Jewish identity and values are not transmitted automatically.
• Each individual must assume personal responsibility for the flourishing of Jewish life. Our homes should reflect our Jewish ideas and ideals, our traditions and our values.
• We need the wisdom and commitment to create vibrant Jewish lives for ourselves, our families and for our entire community.
• Setting up schools and study halls, creating an environment for religious learning and exploring, transmitting the essential ingredients for a happy and identified Jewish life, have been hallmarks of the Jewish people since earliest time.
• We need to understand without any equivocation that Jewishness lives and is transmitted by means of memory, by feeling a living connection with our past. The study of history should lead us to expand our memories and our identification with our people’s past; it should help us to feel that we are part of the long chain of Jewish tradition.
• We bring the past into the present; we project the present into the future. This is one of the great responsibilities of Jewish parents and grandparents—to imbue the younger generations with a sense of belonging to, and participating in, the history of our people.
• To build a Jewish future is an ongoing challenge and responsibility. It is also an ineffable privilege, a source of infinite delight and a source of our deepest fulfillment as Jews.

The memories, traditions, values and the embrace of Judaism start in and emanate from the home. But community schools are where they are reinforced and come alive. Readers of this weekly update know, helping make those schools become more truly affordable to the majority of our young families is the task that GAJE has taken upon itself.

But as moral suasion has failed to move the Government of Ontario to end the discrimination in education funding in Ontario, we will seek a remedy from the courts. To that end, we hope to be able to announce early in the new year, the launch of the lawsuit seeking to compel the government to provide funding for independent Ontario schools as well.  

If you wish to help underwrite this lawsuit, 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.

•••

Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE),

December 24, 2021

Last week Ontario agreed to make Rapid Covid Antigen Testing Kits available to families of independent schools. In light of the rising tide of the Omicron variant, it could hardly have done otherwise. Protecting children’s lives should be high on the provincial government’s priorities irrespective of the schools the children attend.

The government’s ultimately correct decision regarding the rapid testing kits reinforces the remarkable, puzzling indifference of its resolute refusal to distribute any of the $763 million (Safe Return to Class Fund) from the federal government specifically earmarked for helping Ontario schools better cope with the Covid health crisis. Indeed, Ontario’s testing kits decision is a tacit acknowledgement that its unyielding recalcitrance regarding the (Safe Return to Class Fund) was wrong, especially in light of the fact that the federal government arrived at the sum of $763 million by counting all Ontario children ages 4-18 in Ontario schools. Ottawa’s calculation included the 150,000 children in independent schools. The logic directing Queen’s Park to share rapid testing kits should also have compelled it to distribute a pro-rated, fair portion of the Safe Return to Class Fund to the independent schools.

But, as we know, when it comes to the funding of schools, the Government of Ontario’s refusal to direct public funds to independent school is entrenched in reflexive, unthinking policy that many experts, educators, parents and observers view as anachronistic and simply wrong.

As the Cardus think tank pointed out, however, in new, landmark research entitled Funding All Students released three months ago in September of this year, “Ontario’s lack of equitable funding—entirely excluding the independent-school sector from public funds—is out of step with global and even Canadian norms. At least partially funding students in independent schools is the basic standard in democracies and advanced economies, as well as in Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia.”

The research disclosed that in Canada outside Ontario, 75 percent of independent schools and 84 percent of independent school students are partially publicly funded. More to the point, Cardus points out, that the cost of finally making Ontario’s public education system truly inclusive, diverse and equitable would cost, at most, less than 1% of the current provincial budget.

“Partial funding of students at independent schools in Ontario could cost as little as $535 million, with independent schools receiving 50 percent of the per-student operating funding rate that public schools get. That would be the equivalent of 0.3 percent of the Government of Ontario’s $186 billion annual budget. Even offering full operational funding to Ontario independent schools would cost less than one percent of the annual budget at an estimated $1.5 billion.”

As Cardus persuasively asserts, the government’s financial ability to do the right thing is not really at issue. Rather, its political will is the stumbling block.

In the absence of such political will at Queen’s Park, families of children in independent schools must appeal to the courts to compel the government to do the right thing.  GAJE is planning precisely this. To help underwrite the lawsuit that GAJE is preparing, 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.

•••

Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE),

December 17, 2021

Heavy-handed, oppressive, cynical and self-serving behaviour by governments around the world have created, over the years, a healthy scepticism for the notion that human rights universally carry meaning and weight and a measure of importance countries and societies other than as high-minded ideals embossed on thick paper resting on a pedestal or lining a waste basket.

And more is the shame. For respect for human rights is the bedrock of a society that rests upon the belief in the sanctity of human life. Where such respect is absent, governments (rulers) tend to rule arbitrarily with the clenched iron fist for the benefit of the few rather than with the outstretched hand of the rule of law for the benefit of the many.

Equally is the shame that, since the proclamation and adoption by the General Assembly of the United Nations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 73 years ago this day, the Declaration has itself been ignored, disregarded, and even scorned by individuals and governments alike. For the ideals and the principles it enshrines flow from the deepest fountains of the human heart. We ought never disregard them nor ever cease to reach for them.

The Declaration was intended to affirm the complete, utter rejection by the civilized world of the Nazis and Axis ideology of racism toward and disdain for the lives of others. The Declaration – recognizing “the inherent dignity in all human beings” – marked a high point in humanity’s advance. December 10, 1948 is indeed a date worthy of celebration.

Thankfully, ours is a society, where respect for human rights is enshrined into our laws and into our way of life. Sadly, however, there are occasional breaches in the application of our wide societal respect for human rights. Ontario’s failure to provide equal treatment for all Ontarians in the funding of religious education in its public school system is one such breach – an egregious one – that we hope to remedy. Moral suasion, private lobbying, public advocacy and plain parental pleading have failed over the past quarter century and more to convince Ontario to end repair the breach. The courts now are our only option to compel Queen’s Park to do the right thing. To help underwrite the lawsuit that GAJE is preparing, 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.

•••

Finally, we imagine in light of the rising pandemic numbers among schoolchildren, Queen’s Park this week made Rapid Covid Antigen Testing Kits available to the families in independent schools. All independent schools in Ontario received a communication from the Ministry of Education at the end of the school day on December 6 stating that if they wished to receive the rapid voluntary testing kits for use over the Christmas holidays, they were required to complete the requisite form by 3:00 pm the next day, December 7.

There was a grudging sense of obligation to the government’s decision. But at least it did the right thing. 

•••

Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE),

December 10, 2021

Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk issued her annual report this week. Not surprisingly her staff discovered and uncovered sums of money that were spent ill spent.

Among her findings, as reported by CBC, Ontario disbursed more than $200 million to businesses that weren’t eligible for pandemic relief programs. Of course, we understand that errors will occur when government is called upon to deal with immediate human and business needs, especially during an unrelenting period of crisis (in this case public health) and when eligibility criteria may be vague or misapplied. The “loss” of so large an amount of funds is never to be condoned or justified.

What strikes us, however, as utterly unjustifiable is the juxtaposition of the $200 million mis-expenditure against the government’s unbending refusal to spend any funds to protect children in independent schools (including Jewish schools) against the very same pandemic perils for which they justified the expenditure of some $30 billion in Covid-19 relief.  According to the CBC, “pandemic programs for businesses totalled $11.2 billion, or about a third of the money allocated for provincial COVID-19 relief.”

Our quarrel is not with the attempt by Queen’s Park to aid individuals and businesses fight the pandemic. Our quarrel is with the heartlessness of the government in not spending even the smallest penny to protect children in independent schools from that same pandemic, as if these children were not also threatened by Covid-19.

And as we have pointed out in the past, even when the federal government gave Queen’s Park $763 million to spend specifically to help schools protect their children from Covid, the Premier and the Minister of Education disbursed none of it for the health and protection of the 150,000 children in the independent schools.

The government points with self-congratulations to its record of public assistance for pandemic relief and protection purposes. But we also know that Queen’s Park perpetuates discrimination in the education sector even, as we can now see, in relation to the health of our children during a public health crisis. In this regard, the government simply remains heartless in Ontario.

•••

Moral suasion, private lobbying, public advocacy and plain parental pleading have failed over the past quarter century and more to get Ontario to ends its discrimination in education funding. The courts now are our only option to compel Queen’s Park to do the right thing. 

To help underwrite the lawsuit that GAJE is preparing, 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.

•••

Shabbat shalom. Chanukah samayach.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE),

December 3, 2021

As readers of this weekly update know, GAJE’s core mission is to try to help make Jewish education affordable for as many young families that seek it for their children. Our mission, of course, flows directly from the belief that Judaism is a blessing indeed for all humankind, not for the men, women and children who are Jewish. And that intense Jewish education is the best guarantor that our children will learn and know how to perpetuate Judaism for all generations to come. We support, endorse and encourage families that are able, to provide meaningful Jewish education to their children.

That is why we reproduce, in full below, an important message sent to the community this week from Daniel Held, Chief Program Officer, UJA Federation of Greater Toronto. It is vital that as many young parents be made aware that the community will help share the financial burden – for certain families – of providing a Jewish education for their children.

•••

“We are excited to share that applications for the 2022-23 school year are now open for UJA’s newest Jewish day school affordability program – the Generations Trust Scholarship!

“Think your family won’t qualify for day school tuition relief? You may be surprised! Find out in just two minutes how much you could save through our easy-to use online calculator.

“We believe passionately that every community member who seeks to grow in their Jewish knowledge should have the opportunity to do so. Research confirms the power of a day school education to build future Jewish leaders – and ultimately to create a community defined by high levels of Jewish identity and connections to Israel. Our entire community is stronger when children benefit from Jewish learning.
 

“For more than 40 years, UJA’s Tuition Assistance Program has enabled thousands of students to benefit from a day school education. Unfortunately, many families have not previously qualified for tuition assistance, but have struggled to afford day school with the growing cost of living in the GTA. The Generations Trust Scholarship was launched this spring to fill the gap – and hundreds of families are already benefiting.
 

“We are tremendously grateful to the leading community philanthropists who have made this important program possible. Help us spread the word that day school tuition relief is available for more families than ever across Greater Toronto!

“We encourage you to share this email with family or friends who may be interested.

“Sincerely, Dan Held, Chief Program Officer, UJA Federation of Greater Toronto.”

•••

We urge you to check into THE GENERATIONS TRUST SCHOLARSHIP. It might work for your family.

•••

We also urge you to let the Government of Ontario hear your disappointment, if not anger, with its ongoing discrimination against the children in Jewish and other independent schools. It is unfair and unjust that the government supports the education of only one religion in the province. But it is utterly inexcusable and deeply hurtful that the government is completely indifferent to the health and safety concerns of the children attending Jewish and other independent schools arising from the Covid pandemic.

No other conclusion is supportable in light of the facts:

• Ontario distributed not even one penny to independent schools of the $763 million Safe Return to Class Fund distributed by the federal government to Queen’s Park for the benefit of all Ontario children ages 4 – 18 attending school.

• Ontario is distributing rapid testing only to “publicly funded schools”.

Is there no Covid-related jeopardy to the some 150,000 children in independent schools? Of course, there is. The virus does not discriminate. But the government does. What message caring for them does the government of Ontario send to their parents, grandparents and friends?

Moral suasion, private lobbying, public advocacy and plain parental pleading have failed over the past quarter century and more to get Ontario to ends its discrimination in education funding. Now that we see Ontario also discriminating in matters touching upon the health of our children during a public health crisis, we understand that the courts now are our only option to compel Queen’s Park to do the right thing. 

To help underwrite the lawsuit that GAJE is preparing, 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.

•••

Shabbat shalom. Chanukah samayach.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE),

November 26, 2021

Readers of this space know that GAJE is planning a lawsuit to try to end the Government of Ontario’s funding discrimination against Jewish (and other) independent schools. In the year 2021, in a society that cherishes its democratic rights and freedoms, it is deeply offensive that the Government of Ontario prefers and supports one religion above the others worshipped by Ontarians.

The historic founding agreement of 1867 by which the government justifies its ongoing support for the schools of only one religion is not a bar – nor was it ever intended to be – to the government from doing the right thing for Ontario children of other religious denominations learning in the province’s independent schools.  In contrast to the educational funding policies in Canada’s five largest provinces outside of Ontario, Queen’s Park perpetuates an antiquated, anachronistic system that perpetuates discrimination.

In the past, and quite clearly at present as well, Ontario politicians have argued that educational funding fairness will lead to the shredding of the province’s multicultural fabric or to the ruination of the public school system. These arguments are specious, empty of all substance, and proven to be so by the positive experiences of other provinces. Moreover, the Ontario politicians who continue to shield behind the arrangements and conditions of 1867 have turned experience on its head. For in truth, by standing on the hard rigid edges of discrimination, it is they who tear away at the full potential of our diverse societal fabric, actually diminishing the rich tapestry of the mosaic that is the Canada of 2021 the spirit of which is enshrined in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms (S. 27).

And speaking of doing the right thing and standing for truth, we must question the judgements of officials at the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) in relation to decisions that allow the State of Israel to be vilified under official TDSB sanction.

The CJN carried a story last week describing the fallout from a nasty lunch hour rally on November 12 at Marc Garneau Collegiate Institute, at which students chanted “free Palestine” and “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” and carried signs displaying the same malevolent message.

Educators with the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) say they will work to ensure that students and staff understand the “multiple meanings” of expressions about the Israel-Palestine conflict.

In response to complaints regarding the rally’s import, an executive superintendent and a superintendent of education, signed a letter in which they wrote:

“Those expressions mean different things to different people because of different lived experiences…Some members of the Jewish community have experienced these phrases as antisemitic and hateful. Some Palestinians use the phrases as a statement of their rights as people.”

The CJN reported that the school board said it “will work with staff and students to ensure they understand these multiple meanings and ensure hate is not part of the discussion.”

Of course, everyone in our society has the right to publicly speak their minds and to express opinions however factually incorrect, thoughtless, insensitive or plain galling. The rallying cry at Marc Garneau however were far more than thoughtless, insensitive and galling. They were a call to genocide. And, indeed, they were profoundly hurtful to members of the Jewish community.

That youthful organizers of the rally might be unaware of the truths underlying their public statements or the pain and anger they cause to others may not be surprising. But the educators and board members who authorized this form of verbal brutality should have known better.

The CJN reported that Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre (FSWC) and the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) pointed out to the TDSB the harm created by such exceptionally frightful public displays by the students.

“It’s time the TDSB step up and take responsibility for allowing such a toxic environment to fester through its inaction on previous incidents of antisemitism, creating an atmosphere in which lashing out against the Jewish community is acceptable and Jewish staff and students are left feeling attacked and voiceless,” said Jaime Kirzner-Roberts, director of policy at FSWC.

The board “needs to take urgent, concrete action to address systemic antisemitism,” said Noah Shack, CIJA’s vice president, GTA. The incident at Marc Garneau is the most recent in “a series” of antisemitic incidents that have not been fully addressed by the board, Shack said.

Nothing will more blatantly and harshly shred the province’s multicultural fabric or lead to the ruination of the public school system, than allowing one of the storied and splendid communities  – in this case, the Jewish community – within the province’s multicultural structure to be constantly attacked, disparaged and reviled.

The right thing to do – for us and for the province – is to champion truth and fairness.

The full CJN article is available at:

https://thecjn.ca/news/tdsb-will-explore-multiple-meanings-of-slogans-following-pro-palestinian-rally-by-students/

•••

To help underwrite the lawsuit, 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.

•••

Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)  

November 19, 2021

More than in most weeks, many of us sanctified some of the hours in our lives this week in the remembrance of “things past” – specifically, Kristallnacht and Remembrance Day. In truth, of course, what we remember is never merely drawn from the past but part of the immediacy and sustaining fibre of our lives.

Jews understand this deeply because our collective memory is the forge in which our links one to the other have been fashioned through the millennia. Memory is enshrined in our Holy Books. Our Holy books enshrine our values and traditions. Our values and traditions are who we are.

And it has been in the classroom by virtue of the love and the hard work of our teachers that our children – we – have learned precisely that: who we are. Irrespective of the locale, of the community, of the circumstances of our lives, the living stream of education and teaching has always nourished the Jewish people.

Even in the 11^th century, in correspondence to a Jew in Yemen aimed at providing comfort and empathy to a community in extremis dealing with the spectre of forced mass conversion, Maimonides still emphasized the preeminent importance of education.

“Now, all my fellow countrymen in the Diaspora, it behooves you to hearten one another, the elders to guide the youth, the leaders to direct the masses…It is imperative, my fellow Jews, that you make this great spectacle of the revelation appeal to the imagination of your children,” Maimonides wrote.

Thankfully, our community has an excellent teaching infrastructure and excellent teachers who know how to make “the great spectacle “of our religion “appeal to the imagination” of our children. Maimonides would be pleased to see this. But – if we are permitted to speculate – he would not be pleased to see that, despite the ongoing efforts of our community elders, the cost of educating our children is still beyond the reach of many young families.

•••

In the upcoming week the Government of Ontario will be “offering take-home polymerase chain reaction (PCR) self-collection kits to all publicly funded schools across the province.” (Our emphasis).  The health and safety of children in independent schools are once again ignored by the provincial government. We urge all readers of this update to bring their disappointment if not anger to the attention of their Members of the Provincial Parliament

•••

GAJE will soon launch a lawsuit to try to end the Government of Ontario’s funding discrimination against Jewish (and other) independent schools. We are deeply appreciative of the many individuals who have to date joined our cause, who have contributed in helping underwrite the legal effort. Thus far, we have raised half of the amount needed. Please encourage your friends to also join in our effort. If we do not care, who will?

To donate to the cause, 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.

•••

Be safe. Be well. Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)  

November 12, 2021

Some ten months ago, in January, Ontario’s Minister of Education, Stephen Lecce proudly announced: “To ensure our schools remain safe in January 2021 and beyond…We will do whatever it takes to ensure our kids can continue to learn.” 

The minister had in mind enhancing and upgrading the abilities of schools to provide a safe learning environment for their students and to rapidly test students to detect the presence of the Covid virus. To help fund the ambitious but vital safety program, the province benefited from the federal government Safe Return to Class Fund. Indeed, Ottawa gave Queen’s Park $763 million for the express purpose of making Ontario’s schools more Covid-safe.

But when he spoke about doing “whatever it takes to ensure our kids can continue to learn” Minister Lecce had in mind only the kids who attend public school. The 150,000 children attending independent schools – denominational and non-denominational – were left on their own, to fend for themselves against the horrific pandemic threat even though the amount of money given by Ottawa to Queen’s Park was based upon the number of all children from 4-18 years old attending school in Ontario. (Our emphasis)

In August, three independent schools challenged in Court, Ontario’s refusal to disburse any monies from the Safe Return to Class Fund to protect independent school children. The court decision is still pending.

Further to his promise to “do whatever it takes to ensure our kids can continue to learn,” starting on November 15, Ontario’s schools will receive take-home rapid Covid testing kits. But again, Minister Lecce had in mind only “publicly funded schools.” And again, the 150,000 kids in the province’s independent schools have been left on their own.

In responding to the public health crisis wrought by Covid-19, the province differentiates between children in publicly funded schools and those in independent schools. By what measure of conscience, morality, public health planning or earnest concern for the safety of all children in their classrooms is such governmentally-originated discrimination justifiable?

It is not. It is unconscionable. Ontario’s indifference to the health of independent school children is stunning and unworthy of a government in Canada in the year 2021.

•••

GAJE hopes to soon launch a lawsuit to try to end the Government of Ontario’s funding discrimination against Jewish (and other) independent schools. We are deeply appreciative of the many individuals who have to date joined our cause, who have contributed in helping underwrite the legal effort. Thus far, we have raised half of the amount needed. Please encourage your friends to also join in our effort. If we do not care, who will?

To donate to the cause, 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.

•••

Be safe. Be well. Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)  

November 5, 2021

Memorial commemorations were held across the Jewish world this week in tribute to the late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks on the first anniversary of his passing Cheshvan 20. We would fail our consciences and be untrue to our belief in the pre-eminence of Jewish education as the gateway to celebratory, meaningful and purposeful Jewish life if we too did not reflect on his remarkable impact.

Thus, we reproduce excerpts of the commentary by Rabbi Lord Sacks of Parshat Matot-Masei that we printed in this space in the summer of 2019. His observation on the relationship between the Jewish people and education aptly depicts the belief that has animated our efforts these past six and a half years.

•••

…The fate of Jewish communities, for the most part, was determined by a single factor: their decision, or lack of decision, to put children and their education first. Already in the first century, Josephus was able to write: “The result of our thorough education in our laws, from the very dawn of intelligence, is that they are, as it were, engraved on our souls.” The Rabbis ruled that “any town that lacks children at school is to be excommunicated” (Shabbat 119b). Already in the first century, the Jewish community in Israel had established a network of schools at which attendance was compulsory (Bava Batra 21a) – the first such system in history.

The pattern persisted throughout the Middle Ages. In twelfth-century France a Christian scholar noted: “A Jew, however poor, if he has ten sons, will put them all to letters, not for gain as the Christians do, but for the understanding of God’s law – and not only his sons but his daughters too.”

In 1432, at the height of Christian persecution of Jews in Spain, a council was convened at Valladolid to institute a system of taxation to fund Jewish education for all. In 1648, at the end of the Thirty Years’ War, the first thing Jewish communities in Europe did to re-establish Jewish life was to reorganise the educational system….

It is hard to think of any other religion or civilisation that has so predicated its very existence on putting children and their education first. There have been Jewish communities in the past that were affluent and built magnificent synagogues – Alexandria in the first centuries of the Common Era is an example. Yet because they did not put children first, they contributed little to the Jewish story. They flourished briefly, then disappeared.

…Children come first, property is secondary. Civilisations that value the young stay young. Those that invest in the future have a future. It is not what we own that gives us a share in eternity, but those to whom we give birth and the effort we make to ensure that they carry our faith and way of life into the next generation.

For Jews, education is not just what we know. It’s who we are. No people ever cared for education more. Our ancestors were the first to make education a religious command, and the first to create a compulsory universal system of schooling – eighteen centuries before Britain.

The Rabbis valued study as higher even than prayer….The Egyptians built pyramids, the Greeks built temples, the Romans built amphitheatres. Jews built schools. They knew that to defend a country you need an army, but to defend a civilisation you need education. So, Jews became the people whose heroes were teachers, whose citadels were schools, and whose passion was study and the life of the mind. How can we deprive our children of that heritage?

…In a single generation, nowadays, there is more scientific and technological advance than in all previous centuries since human beings first set foot on earth. In uncharted territory, you need a compass. That’s what Judaism is. It guided our ancestors through good times and bad. It gave them identity, security, and a sense of direction. It enabled them to cope with circumstances more varied than any other people have ever known. It lifted them, often, to heights of greatness. Why? Because Judaism is about learning. Education counts for more in the long run than wealth or power or privilege. Those who know, grow.

•••

Following Rabbi Lord Sacks’ thought, how can we not do everything in our power to enable as many Jewish children as possible to know their heritage? Rabbi Lord Sacks was profoundly wise and committed with all his heart to a vital, thriving future for his people. His memory will be a blessing for all time.

•••

In the coming weeks, GAJE will announce the launch of a lawsuit to try to end the Government of Ontario’s funding discrimination against Jewish (and other) independent schools. We are deeply appreciative of the many individuals who have to date joined our cause, who have contributed in helping underwrite the legal effort. Thus far, we have raised half of the amount needed. Please encourage your friends to also join in our effort. If we do not care, who will?

To donate to the cause, 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.

•••

Be safe. Be well. Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)  

October 29, 2021

The CJN reported this week that “enrolment at Toronto’s non-Orthodox Jewish day schools has increased for a second consecutive year, reversing a 17-year decline.” Some 3,861 students are enrolled in kindergarten to Grade 8, in non-Orthodox day schools, an increase from 3,805 last year; 1,231 students are enrolled in TanenbaumCHAT, an increase from 1,096 last year.

Daniel Held, Chief Program Officer of UJA Federation of Greater Toronto noted that the increase in enrolment is not only due to the schools’ quick and substantive response to Covid. The sense of community fostered in the various schools and their respective academic excellence, he pointed out, are also sources of strong attraction for parents and their families. The new UJA Federation grant program, Generations Trust, is also enabling more young families to enroll their children in day school.

The CJN article can be found at: https://thecjn.ca/news/the-cjn-briefing-october-20/

•••

The article in The CJN echoes similar observations about the phenomenon of the Covid-inspired discovery of day school education by a number of “new” families across North America. The findings were published by Prizmah, the Center for Jewish Day Schools, in a recent report entitled, Seizing the Moment: Transferring to Jewish Day School During the Covid-19 Pandemic.

The key findings of the report are:

• After a year being enrolled in Jewish day school – parents have largely been thrilled by their experience.

• Parents expressed appreciation for the quality of the educational and social dimensions of the experience at Jewish day schools.

• Jewish day schools are “nurturing environments,” “caring,” “warm,” “having a strong emphasis on community,” “welcoming,” “loving,” and “friendly.” When parents decided to transfer their children to a Jewish day school, these qualities were front of mind.

• Strong relationships contributed significantly to the positive experience of parents, with 85% identifying the strength, frequency, and variety of positive relationships at the school: among the students, among families, and between teachers and families. 

• Overall, three-quarters of parents plan for their children to stay at their new school. 

In commenting on the findings of the report, Prizmah’s CEO Paul Bernstein observed that “sending your kid to school is about much more than academics.” He is correct. It is about the kind of life we hope they will lead.

The article and the report can be found at:

https://prizmah.org/knowledge/resource/seizing-moment-transferring-jewish-day-school-during-covid-19-pandemic

•••

As followers of GAJE know, our effort to enable as many families to experience a Jewish education requires that such education be affordable to the largest swath possible of young families. And we are convinced that true, permanent affordability requires the Government of Ontario to end its discriminatory educational funding. Behind-the-scenes lobbying, up-front public discussion and all manner of moral suasion have failed to convince successive Governments of Ontario to undo the discrimination. Thus, in the coming weeks, GAJE will announce the launch of the lawsuit to try to end the discrimination.

We are deeply appreciative of the many individuals who have joined our cause, who have contributed to helping underwrite the lawsuit. To date, we have raised half of the amount needed.  Please encourage your friends to join in our effort.

If we will not try to end the injustice of Ontario’s educational funding discrimination, who will?

To donate to the cause, 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.

•••

Be safe. Be well.

Shabbat shalom.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)  

October 22, 2021