Back to work.

The Funding committee is refining and organizing a series of new funding options to present to the public.

The Marketing committee is working on the details of a community event to be held, it is hoped, in the autumn.

The Political and Legal Action committee is proceeding with two items on its agenda.

Full reports on the committees’ work will be submitted in due course.

•••

Last month, Elliot Abrams, the former American diplomat and currently a senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote a thoughtful, if provocative essay in Mosaic Magazine, “If American Jews and Israel are Drifting Apart, What’s the Reason?”

The essay evoked considerable response and especially interesting elucidatory support by three scholars, Daniel Gordis, Martin Kramer and Jack Wertheimer, each of whom echoed Abrams’ thesis but for different reasons.

Subsequently, in response to the responders, Abrams suggested that there was a path that offered a way to mitigate if not entirely avoid the looming divide between the two largest Jewish communities in the world. That path, Abrams wrote was Jewish education.

Abrams wrote specifically about the Jewish community in the United States. But the Jews of Canada should take his observations to heart as well. For our ethnic-religious situation might soon mirror that of our American co-religionists.

“But [full integration into American society] is now a fact, and staring the American non-Orthodox in the face is the prospect of Jewish assimilation leading to Jewish extinction. That being the reality, is it possible that day schools might be re-examined?

“One critical barrier here, even for the moderately affluent, is financial: on top of the other burdens of engaged Jewish life—synagogue dues, summer camps, kosher food, and so forth—day schools are an expensive proposition. Especially in localities boasting excellent public schools, they may seem either beyond reach or unnecessary, or both. And here, to make things worse, the organized community’s priorities are upside-down. Rather than making sure that a day-school education is affordable and available to all who want it—as Jack Wertheimer has tirelessly advocated—Jewish agencies have not only undervalued the relative worth of such an education but have often led the fight against extending any help at all to religious schools in general, even in the form of vouchers, tuition tax credits, or other tax breaks that are clearly constitutional.

“The day-school movement in America is one of the proven secrets of continuing Orthodox strength and solidarity. As Wertheimer has written, a day-school education ‘greatly increases the chances of children learning the skills necessary for participation in religious life, for living active Jewish lives, and for identifying strongly with other Jews.’ One can only hope that non-Orthodox Jews and Jewish organizations seeking to survive in America will reconsider its benefits and relax their visceral and ideological opposition to communal and other forms of support for non-public schools.

“Whether or not they do, however, I join my three respondents in fearing the near-irreversibility of the underlying trends contributing to the weakening of the American Jewish community. All the more reason, then, to keep front and center in one’s consciousness the single key fact of modern Jewish existence: for the first time in 2,000 years there is a Jewish state, it is growing and thriving, and it is becoming the center of world Jewish life. Would we want it otherwise? American Jews today may be declining in strength and centrality, but they are also witness to and can actively participate in the miracle of the Jewish state. In Daniel Gordis’s words, Israel is ‘the Jewish people’s last remaining hope.’ It is also something more: something, in Martin Kramer’s words, that we should always regard just as a hundred generations of Jews before us would have done—with “pure wonder.”

•••

With the commemoration of Yom Hashoah v’Hagvurah this week, we have entered a uniquely poignant period of collective history that inspires profound feelings of peoplehood. Next week we commemorate Yom Hazicaron. Then, as evening falls on Yom Hazicaron, we switch emotional gears to celebrate Israel’s 68th Yom Ha’atzma’ut.

When the day arrives that Jewish education is affordable in perpetuity, we will then see that these feelings of Jewish peoplehood will also be assured in perpetuity.

Shabbat shalom.

We urge you to commemorate Yom Hazicaron and to celebrate Yom Ha’atzma’ut!

GAJE

The Sedarim of 2016 are past. Their magical moments will now become new entries into our respective memory banks of all holidays past.

•••

At this juncture in our effort, one year after we began, it is important to remind our members and followers of our twofold task. We quote from our founding document. “We will be the catalysts for placing the subject of day school affordability back onto the community’s agenda. More importantly, we will be the catalysts for actually finding solutions.”

Some individuals doubt we will succeed. Some are skeptical. Doubts and skepticism are indeed warranted and justifiable given the extent of the task ahead of us.

But we will succeed. Eventually. And as we also note from our founding document, failure is not an option.

We are buttressed in our resolve by the recent comments by Rabbi Marc D. Angel, the head of the Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals in New York, on the Torah reading for the seventh day of Pesach.

“The 19th century Rabbi Israel Salanter once quipped: “When people come to a wall that they can’t go through, they stop. When Jews come to a wall that they can’t go through–they go through.”

“The Torah reading on the Seventh Day of Pessah includes the dramatic episode of the Israelites crossing the Red Sea. When they reached the shore of the sea, they faced an existential crisis. Behind them, the Egyptian troops were coming to destroy them. In front of them was the Red Sea. They were trapped, with no obvious solution to their dilemma.

“The Midrash tells of various reactions among the Israelites as they pondered their imminent destruction. Some said: we should have stayed in Egypt! Others said: the situation is hopeless; we and our families will perish. Woe unto us.

“The common denominator of these approaches is that they led to psychological and emotional paralysis. Crying over what they could have done or should have done did not address their current crisis; it stifled their ability to cope. Declaring the situation to be hopeless led to despair. They came to a wall–and they stopped.

“The Midrash tells that Nahshon ben Aminadav, head of the tribe of Judah, walked into the Red Sea. When the water reached his neck, then the sea miraculously split–and the Israelites were saved. Nahshon is described as a great hero because he took things into his own hands; he acted decisively…

“Nahshon came to a wall–and he went through; and he brought the rest of the people through as well.

“Worrying that stems from regret that we should have or could have done things differently–such worrying is negative and self-defeating. The past is over, and we need to confront the crisis as it faces us now. We don’t have the option of returning to the past to undo decisions. (Hopefully, we can learn from these past decisions when we get through the current crisis, and contemplate how to make future decisions.) Likewise, it is not productive to sink into self-pity and passive despair. Indeed, despair feeds on itself and infects others with a spirit of helplessness.

“We should worry like Nahshon worried. We should not minimize the dangers and the risks; but we should deliberate on what is at stake and how we can overcome the difficulty. We should have confidence that if God has brought us this far, He will keep His promises to us and bring us ultimate redemption. We should be ready to act decisively, to think “out of the box”, to maintain forward momentum.”

•••

To the doubters and skeptics we say: We have hit a wall. But we are going through it. Please join us.

The next major step for GAJE is to bring to the attention of the public some of our proposed new, reimagined, “out of the box” options for funding Jewish education.

Stay tuned.

Chag samayach.

GAJE

The next eight days provide somewhat of a lull in our work. After Pesach however, committees will resume their work, with lingering images of poignant Seder moments freshly inspiring us to do so.

•••

Eight days ago a sophisticated blogger (Relevance in the Age of Affordability by drdan) responded to a speech by American philanthropist Michael Steinhardt on March 9 in Philadelphia (see our March 18, 2016 update) in which Steinhardt decried the failure of secular, liberal Judaism to provide relevant Jewish education to this generation of young Jews in the United States.

Steinhardt lamented the absence of a meaningful non-religious Jewish Day School system in the United States. But he rejected the notion that the cost of tuition was a major causal factor. There were “more important factors” for this decline according to Steinhardt.

The blogger emphatically disagreed with Steinhardt. “One cannot have a serious discussion about relevance in Jewish education, about creating learning opportunities that speak to the next generation of Jews and foster viable Jewish identification without addressing the most pressing issue of 21st century Jewish education. Affordability.

“One cannot be alive in 2016… and not be cognizant of the fact that Jewish families, liberal Jewish families, even with the best of intentions, cannot afford to send their children to Jewish day schools.

“They cannot get their kids into the room where relevant (or irrelevant) Jewish learning takes place. Their kids cannot take advantage of the best practices and all the opportunities available in day school settings because their salaries cannot keep up with the increasing cost of day school tuition.

“But I would argue that for every Jewish family who preferred to send their child to a school with a more haimishe view on universalism (say, a Quaker school) than a parochial Jewish day school, there are at least THREE to FIVE Jewish families who would have loved to fill that open spot in the Jewish classroom but simply could not afford it.

“We cannot expect to have a viable Jewish community if vast number of us are ignorant of our history, culture, language and tradition. This is the stuff of which irrelevance is made… and extinction.”

•••

Pesach begins in a few hours, tonight.

It is the only holy day on our religious calendar whose core commandment is the coming together of family and friends and invited guests for a festive meal and for the retelling of the exodus of our forebears from slavery in Egypt.

The exodus is the defining moment of our history. It is the foundation stone of our peoplehood. We recount the miraculous departure from ancient Egypt each day, every day, in our prayers and all our ritual practices. For us, it is the beginning of who we are as a people.

Perhaps that is why the Haggadah ordains that, irrespective of the level of one’s learning and wisdom, everyone is expected to recount the great story of the Jewish slaves exodus from their oppressors in Egypt. The story is simply that important.

By providing a Jewish education for our children and for all our children throughout the generations, we will ensure that the story is retold and our sense of peoplehood preserved for all eternity. In the words of the blogger above, “We cannot expect to have a viable Jewish community if vast number of us are ignorant of our history, culture, language and tradition. This is the stuff of which irrelevance is made… and extinction.”

And that is precisely why we have all joined forces to create Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education. The education of our children is vital. It must not be beyond the financial reach of their families.

Chag samayach.

GAJE

The meeting held earlier this week by Funding Committee to discuss new ideas and new possibilities towards funding was as heartening as it was spirited. In addition to four GAJE members, seven other individuals also attended. Space limited numbers. Moreover, we wished to encourage uninhibited, substantive, respectful discussion on the merits of the proposals that were raised. There were two criteria for choosing the individuals who were invited to share their ideas with GAJE: (1) a recognized, widely acknowledged expertise in a business-related field, and (2) a recognized, widely acknowledged commitment to the cause of ensuring the viability of Jewish education.

Original thinking was on evidence throughout the meeting. A number of new proposals were suggested and debated. The ideas were recorded. They will be refined, made more precious and further presented to and “tested” with groups of parents.

It is hoped that the ideas will be ready for public presentation in the late spring. We are determined to present new, meaningful, substantive possibilities for individuals and families to consider in the effort to make Jewish education affordable.

•••

The CJN this week published an essay by Rabbi Eddie Shostak of Montreal entitled Driving Rabbi Sacks. The article is an elegantly written first person by Rabbi Shostak of his having been asked to be Rabbi Sacks’ chauffeur during the latter’s recent visit to Montreal. Among the goals Rabbi Shostak set for himself from this unique opportunity, was to ask Rabbi Sacks “one good question.”

The question Rabbi Shostak posed to Rabbi Sacks was: “Where can one make a greater impact on Jewish lives – in a day school or at a synagogue?” And this is how Rabbi Shostak recording Rabbi Sacks’ response.

“Rabbi Sacks paused before rejecting the simple binary offered: ‘Without question, one can make the most impact in day schools,” he said. ‘Communities should have their primary focus on day schools but in partnership with strong synagogues.’”

In the column, Rabbi Shostak elaborates upon Rabbi Sacks’ straightforward but somewhat clipped answer. Among the key insights Rabbi Shostak-Rabbi Sacks offer is the core conclusion that animates our cause. “Study after study shows that Jewish engagement is dependent more than ever on day school education.”

We commend the article to you. Unfortunately, at the current time, it is not yet posted to the Canadian Jewish News website (http://www.cjnews.com), but we hope it will be available there shortly.
•••

We wish you well in your Pesach preparations.

Shabbat shalom.

GAJE

The Funding Committee is sponsoring a meeting next week in which new ideas and new possibilities towards funding will be the only subject. A full report will follow outlining the most viable possibilities.

There will actually be new options for individuals and families to consider in the effort to make Jewish education affordable.

•••

An article appeared this week in The CJN about the results of a survey by UJA Federation of Greater Toronto’s Julia & Henry Koschitzky Centre for Jewish Education on the nature and perhaps too the extent, of the Jewish engagement of the Jewish community in York Region. One of its key findings, reproduced below, is germane to our work.

The survey was based upon 4,600 responses. According to the article, the population of Vaughan more than doubled in the last 20 or so years, from 21,290 in 1991 to 47,135 in 2011. As of 2011, 30 per cent of Jewish Torontonians under the age of five live in Vaughan.

Daniel Held, executive director of the Koschitzky Centre, said one striking finding was that in Vaughan overall, even among the most Jewishly engaged, parents of school-age children responded “maybe” far more than “definitely” to questions of whether they would send their kids to Jewish day school, supplementary school, day camp, overnight camp and early childhood education programs.

Although, as Held stated, deeper study of the responses needs to be conducted, the survey did show, that across Jewish institutions, finances were the greatest barrier to entry for respondents in the “maybe” category (our emphasis).

“In a presentation he prepared for UJA Federation’s board of directors that he supplied to The CJN, Held said it was surprising to learn that finances proved such a significant barrier to families not only for sending kids to day school, but also to supplementary Jewish schools and residential camps.

“It’s clear that the cost of engaging with the Jewish community, in any form, is a barrier we need to lower… especially for middle income families,” he said.

•••

GAJE is committed to helping lower the financial barrier currently barring the way for many families to Jewish education. And as we wrote last week, It is our belief that the obligation to make Jewish education meaningfully accessible to as many families who seek it for their children falls upon the entire community. This belief is in keeping with Jewish history and with the actions of our forebears in every generation who understood that securing a Jewish future meant securing the Jewish education of each and every subsequent generation of Jews.

Pesach looms. What an opportunity to revel in and reflect upon one of the uniquely Jewish experiences in our lives!

Shabbat shalom.

GAJE

In the coming weeks we will again appeal to the rabbis in our community to take up our cause, supporting it and speaking out on its behalf from their respective pulpits or places of teaching. It is our hope that when the rabbis will be ready and able to speak in support of the need for affordable Jewish education, we will have introduced to the public a number of new, re-imagined ideas for funding Jewish education.

There will actually be new options for individuals and families to consider in the effort to make Jewish education affordable.

It is our belief that the obligation to make Jewish education meaningfully accessible to as many families who seek it for their children falls upon the entire community. This belief is in keeping with Jewish history and the actions of our forebears in every generation and in every country in which they settled or which they merely “visited.”

•••

The late Edgar Bronfman’s autobiography, Why Be Jewish?, was reviewed last week by Steve Linde in the Jerusalem Post. For many years, Bronfman was the head of the World Jewish Congress, a post that he used to doggedly and determinedly advocate on behalf of Jewish rights and advance the wellbeing of Jewish communities around the world. As Bronfman makes plain in the book, he came to an appreciation of his Jewish identity only later in life. He was not an observant Jew, but he was a deeply proud Jew who endeavoured to learn as much as he could about his people’s history, heritage, culture, traditions and faith. He was a fierce fighter for the Jewish people as many Swiss bankers and European diplomats will reluctantly attest.

Some of Bronfman’s observations and Linde’s comments bear directly upon GAJE’s work and are worthy of publishing here.

The idea of Jewish peoplehood and kinship is central to Edgar Bronfman’s life, and his last book, Why Be Jewish? is a well-crafted legacy of a modern-day Moses who surveys the critical challenges facing the Jewish people throughout its history, and issues “a clarion call to a generation of secular, disaffected and unaffiliated Jews.”

“As a Jewish leader, I am well aware that unless we win over our disinterested Jews, a nearly 4,000-yearold civilization of tremendous beauty and worth could end up in the dustbin of history,” he warns.

Bronfman views the Jewish people as “one of the many vibrant patches on the richly diverse quilt of humanity.”

“To identify with the Jewish people does not mean to care only for the fates of other Jews,” he says.

“In fact, the opposite is true. The Jewish tradition, from ancient to modern times, has always placed tremendous emphasis on protecting and caring for those who are different.”

Having said this, Bronfman is a strong proponent of Jews helping Jews. It was the notion of Jewish peoplehood, he says, that motivated him to become president of the World Jewish Congress, an organization dedicated to the interests and security of the Jewish people.

“My deep sense of peoplehood gave me the fortitude to fight the difficult battles to secure the freedom of Soviet Jews and to help recover Jewish assets stolen by the Nazis. It inspired me to relentlessly advocate with President George H.W. Bush in order to persuade him to help undo the 1972 UN resolution equating Zionism with racism.

“And it was peoplehood that fueled my quest to convince the Spanish and German governments to recognize or live up to their responsibilities to Israel.

All of these were very big battles, but as a Jew I felt duty-bound to wage them.”

The book was completed just weeks before Bronfman died on December 21, 2013 at the age of 84, and has been published posthumously by Hachette.

Although not a rabbi, scholar or educator, he says that in his roles as a Jewish activist and philanthropist, “I developed a deep and absorbing love for our traditions and people. It is this passion that I seek to pass along.”

Bronfman propagated twelve principles which he offers as advice for leading and living a Jewish life:

1. Revere godliness: the true, the good and the beautiful.
2. Ask questions.
3. Commit to repairing the outer and inner world.
4. Perform acts of loving-kindness.
5. Assist society’s weakest members.
6. Champion social justice and environmental causes.
7. Welcome the stranger.
8. Engage with Jewish traditions, texts, philosophy, history and art.
9. Study and strive for excellence in the humanities and other secular fields.
10. Promote family and community.
11. Embrace key Jewish holidays and life-cycle events.
12. Conduct business ethically.

Bronfman writes “Just as Moses brought the tablets of law from the mountaintop, Judaism, through its emphasis on ethics, morality, and human relationships, brings the divine to earth,”

“That is the heart of Jewish spirituality.”

•••

Bronfman embraced his “Jewish” awakening at the age of 60. May our work enable Jewish youngsters to embrace their own awakenings much earlier.

Shabbat shalom.

GAJE

Members on each of our committees are fully engaged on a number of projects that interconnect and that we hope will eventually form an integrated program of action for GAJE.

The Political and Legal Action Committee is taking part in CIJA’s Task Force on Affordable Jewish Education. Even as we participate in the task force’s deliberations, we are also monitoring its progress with great interest. In addition to our work with the task force, the committee is also pursuing the feasibility of other steps in relation to possible legal or political action to help make Jewish education affordable.

The Marketing Committee is trying to assemble the pieces of a program of a community event to be held in the late summer or early fall.

And the Funding Committee is constantly meeting with a variety of individuals from different business and financial disciplines to present newly imagined funding options to the public at large.

•••

Yesterday we celebrated Purim.

Unlike Esther and many of her co-religionists who lived in those days in Shushan, Purim, we wear no literal or metaphorical masks to succeed as Jews in our community. Our Judaism is as vital to us as the air we breathe. It informs who we are to the rest of our world and even, to ourselves. Who would we be without our Judaism?

On March 16, Tablet published a story by Olivia Gordon, entitled A Second Chance For a Jewish Education. It is a poignant cri de ceour by the author who laments not having been more interested in her Jewish education or in a significantly Jewish way of life as a young child.

Later in life, married and with children, she decides it is important to try to find for her children a way of life that had eluded her.

She does not write about day school. She writes about supplementary school, or what she refers to as cheder. Nor is the story about an exorbitant cost of Jewish education. But it touches a sensitive nerve because of the longing the author depicts for a system and level of knowledge and a way of life she had once spurned.

“In September, Humphrey [the author’s son] will move up into cheder proper—and I’m excited. There aren’t many Jews in Oxford, but through cheder, he will get to make Jewish friends his own age. The cheder leader is so full of fun ideas for the children that apparently these days they don’t want to miss a week. There are sleepovers, a summer camp, and all kinds of creative arts and drama. And when it comes to learning Hebrew, now that I’m grown up, I think, “How amazing to get to learn this back-to-front, ancient language.” I can only hope Humphrey sees it the same way, but I’m already looking forward to studying Hebrew along with him—and giving myself a second chance.”

As an adult, the author understood that she no longer needed the mask she had worn in her younger days. And she embraced the opportunity to live her Jewish life anew.

•••

Shabbat shalom.

GAJE

Next week, March 23 and 24, we will be celebrating Purim. Because we are in a leap year, the holiday coincides with the advent of spring. More than all of our holidays, Purim, is a visual and experiential delight for our young children. But all of our holidays, in significant ways, are geared toward our children. A mere four weeks later, we will be celebrating the actual Festival of Spring (Pesach). In so doing, we will usher into our respective personal and family lives a period of seven weeks that throb with profound communal significance. We will celebrate and commemorate Pesach, Yom Hashoah v’Hagvurah, Yom Hazicaron, Yom Ha’atzmaut and Shavuot, all deeply significant and ethereal moments on our earthly Jewish calendar.

Include the children.

Participating in the holidays is one of the ways that helps embed forever into the souls of our children the precious, life-sustaining sense of belonging to the Jewish people.

Helping embed that life-long sense of belonging is the essence of the first purpose of GAJE’s activities.

•••

Many people know Michael Steinhardt as the American philanthropist who, along with Charles Bronfman, helped found the successful Birthright program that has introduced thousands of Jewish youth to the State of Israel.

As reported recently in the Jewish Exponent of Philadelphia, Steinhardt is embracing a new cause to place high on the community’s agenda. He now “wants to change the way we think about day school education.” His key concern is how to expand non-Orthodox day school education in the United States to reach “a much wider group of people.” According to Steinhardt, fewer than 10 percent of non-Orthodox children go to day schools.

“The community writ large should reflect upon the fact that the great majority of non-Orthodox young people don’t attend day schools and ask why that is,” Steinhardt told the Jewish Exponent.

Steinhardt argues that without a redefinition of communal values, the future looks bleak. He wants to lead the discussion about redefining those communal values.

“The fact is,” Steinhardt says, “day-school graduates are much better-educated Jews than their peers who don’t have a day school education.” And at the end of the day,

Steinhardt may not define Jewish education the way we might in Canada or include the same curricula components as we might in Montreal and Toronto. But based upon unassailable empirical evidence from study after study, observers of Jewish communities around the world, including in Canada, do agree with him that it is Jewish education that is the prime determinant of Jewish continuity.

Helping make Jewish education affordable is the essence of the second purpose of GAJE’s activities.

•••

Shabbat shalom.

GAJE

• The Limmud Toronto Conference last weekend was a tremendous success. Large numbers of people attended the conference and enthusiastically participated in the diverse offerings of study, discussion and debate.

The presentation by Jeff Stutz on behalf of GAJE was well received. Participants reported that the presentation was instructive and at times, inspiring.

• We are in the planning stages of a community event to be held later this year. The objective of the event will be to further discuss how our community can start taking urgently needed steps to resolve the affordability crisis. Details will follow in due course.

• • •

In sharing his thoughts on Parshat Pekudei, Rabbi Marc Angel, the leader of The Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals in New York, writes about the importance of offering praise for praiseworthy behaviour.

Rabbi Angel suggests “May the Shekhinah rest upon the work of our hands” is the highest form of praise a person can receive. Knowing that one is doing praiseworthy work, Rabbi Angel says, will evoke a “feeling of spiritual bliss” which he adds is “the ultimate human fulfillment.”

This is the blessing of praise we extend to all individuals and organizations, parents, teachers and administrators who strive to make Jewish education available and affordable to the children of our community.  May the “Shekhinah rest upon the work of your hands” and may you all, as a result, experience that sense of “ultimate human fulfillment” knowing that what you are doing is immensely important for the future generations of Jews.

• • •

Shabbat shalom.

GAJE

GAJE will be part of the Limmud Toronto Conference this weekend on Sunday March 6. We hope that you will attend the conference and especially the session concerning GAJE. We hope that you will tell friends and family about the conference and urge them to attend too.

For information about the conference, visit www.Limmud.ca.

•••

We have posted an article entitled “The Day School Enterprise Can Succeed” on the Articles page of our website. It appeared in late February on the eJewish Philanthropy website.

The nub of the article deals with the importance of day schools in fostering a sense of Jewish vitality for the future while acknowledging the many problems that beset the day school structure in North America.

“Where we all agree is that Jewish day schools are a vital component of any vibrant Jewish ecosystem. As communities grapple with how to creatively and strategically engage the next generation of Jews they must not forget that day school education offers an unparalleled depth of knowledge, strength of identity building, and richness of community for students and families.

“Communities must chip away at the challenges inherent in the current Jewish day school model with strategies that maximize resources and continue to make day schools attractive to a broad range of families.”

That is precisely why GAJE has formed. We are trying to help steer a community-wide conversation not only to ensure that day schools remain attractive to the a broad range of families but rather more, to ensure the permanent viability of Jewish education in its fullest sense in our community.

Our community-wide is being mirrored throughout communities in North America. Federation professionals, lay leaders, organizations, think-tanks, foundations, and parents and grandparents of students in day schools around throughout North America are mobilizing to for the same purpose.

The complete article can be accessed from the Articles page on our website.

•••

Shabbat shalom.

GAJE