In last week’s update GAJE reported on an initiative by the Yael Foundation aimed at enhancing the skills and abilities principals of Jewish schools around the world to enable them to enrich the learning experience of their respective schools.

The Foundation’s website described its mission as, “to enable a Jewish child in any city and in any community, small or large, to receive prestigious and value-oriented Jewish and general education. “As of last summer, the Yael Foundation is supporting Jewish education…in 28 countries on all continents.”

The initiative is based upon the proven notion that investing in school principals is one of the most effective ways to improve education. 

This week, GAJE brings supporters’ attention to a companion piece about the importance and even the urgency of Jewish education written by Naomi Kovitz, deputy director of the Yael Foundation. Entitled, Education should be the response to the threats of our enemies – opinion,

it appeared in the Jerusalem Post on September 9.

We reproduce Kovitz’ op-ed because we share its message.

The following are brief excerpts.

“In Israel and among Jewish students around the world, our children are exposed to the horrors of war, hate, and violence, and so it is the responsibility of educators to create a space that both addresses the issues but also shelters them and creates positivity, fostering leadership and empowering the next generation of leaders.

“This allows our children to navigate the uncertainty and fears they are bombarded with at home, online and on the streets, in a more developmentally healthy manner. We often say that children are our future, and they will be tomorrow’s leaders, but we also have to consider the here and now, because today matters.

“That is why it is our foundational doctrine that all Jewish children should have access to high-quality Jewish and general education regardless of their geographic location or community size.

Especially now, with antisemitism at record levels globally, many Jewish parents around the world are removing or considering removing their children from their local schools and exploring options for Jewish educational institutions.”

Kovitz emphasizes the very important point that “every single day counts, educationally, socially and structurally, in the life of a child in school.”

Again, GAJE agrees.

•••

In a decision released September 10, a three-member panel of the Divisional Court agreed with the Province of Ontario that GAJE’s lawsuit for fairness in educational funding should be dismissed. GAJE will seek leave to appeal this decision.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom

Am Yisrael Chai

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

September 27, 2024

GAJE has written in the past about the recent surge in efforts by Jews of all ages and levels of communal affiliations across North America to enhance their knowledge of Judaism and to join in and experience the sense of Jewish peoplehood that might have been lacking to date in their lives.

The surge is directly traceable to the assault on Jews and on the State of Israel that has sprung to sordid life on streets, campuses, union halls and media newsrooms throughout the West. Ironically, in their efforts to do away with the Jewish people and the ancestral/modern Jewish State, the haters are actually driving a campaign of Jewish “growth” and “renewal” in all realms of Jewish life.

Philanthropists, educators and Jewish school administrators in the Jewish world have taken note of the surge and are trying to put in place systems to substantively pivot from and appropriately accommodate the changes occurring in our lives.

One such effort was reported last month in the Jerusalem Post. It told of an initiative by the Yael Foundation aimed at enhancing the skills and abilities principals of Jewish schools around the world to enable them to enrich the learning experience of their respective schools.

According to its website, “the Yael Foundation was created in 2020 by Jewish philanthropists Uri and Yael Poliavich, relying on their vision of the global Jewish community as one family bound by shared values and a commitment to mutual support. Our Foundation is committed to enable a Jewish child in any city and in any community, small or large, to receive prestigious and value-oriented Jewish and general education. As of Summer 2023, Yael Foundation is supporting more than 50 schools, kindergartens, Sunday schools and afterschools, and special educational initiatives in 28 countries on all continents.”

The initiative is based upon the proven notion that investing in school principals is one of the most effective ways to improve education. 

“Principals are the directors of their schools; everything derives from their ability to educate and innovate in impactful ways,” said Uri Poliavich, co-founder of the Yael Foundation. “This program is a direct and lasting investment in a strong and enduring future for Jewish education around the world. Jewish students receiving a high-quality Jewish education has always been important, but especially now, with the upsurge of interest in Jewish schools, it is absolutely essential.”

Chaya Yosovich, CEO of the Yael Foundation, places this latest effort to enhance and constantly improve Jewish education in its proper context: “We are seeing a surge of interest in applications for Jewish schools around the world, and we know that much of this interest is driven by anti-Semitic intimidation and fear. The challenge for those involved in Jewish education is ensuring that Jewish schools need to be more than just a haven from threats or abuse; they should be centers of excellence, competing with the best non-Jewish schools in their countries or regions. We want parents and prospective students to run towards our schools and not run away from other schools.”

GAJE agrees with Yosovich’s approach. She has described a key aspiration for all Jewish education. We bring this initiative to the attention of our readers because we deeply believe that knowing more of how Jewish communities worldwide is responding to these difficult days, is important. We can more easily find strength and hope, if not quite optimism, in knowing that Jews throughout the world are standing together, side by side, to resist the haters.

The article about the initiative can be found at:

https://www.jpost.com/j-spot/article-817126?utm_source=jpost.app.apple&utm_medium=share

•••

In a decision released September 10, a three-member panel of the Divisional Court agreed with the Province of Ontario that GAJE’s lawsuit for fairness in educational funding should be dismissed. GAJE will seek leave to appeal this decision.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom

Am Yisrael Chai

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

September 20, 2024

The headline above says it all. And cuts very deeply.

A three-member panel of the Divisional Court agreed with the Province of Ontario that GAJE’s lawsuit for fairness in educational funding should be dismissed. In arriving at this decision, the court set aside Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s decision in late 2023, dismissing Ontario’s motion to strike the application, saying that it was not plain and obvious that the application would fail.

Judge Papageorgiou ruled that the SCC’s Adler decision in 1996 might be eligible for review in light of the circumstances and legal developments that have occurred since 1996. She made no ruling regarding the substance of GAJE’s claim. Instead, she decided that there were good reasons to let GAJE’s claim receive a full hearing on its merits. In other words, she dismissed Ontario’s assertion that the application was doomed to fail. Ontario appealed this ruling.

We will offer no comments upon the Divisional Court’s reasoning overturning Judge Papageorgiou’s decision. Suffice to say, GAJE disagrees with the court’s analysis and conclusion.

We do however comment again, how deep is our disappointment that the Government of Ontario, will not even abide a hearing of GAJE’s claim. We do comment again that Ontario is the only province, apart from the Atlantic provinces, that contributes nothing toward the education of its children in independent schools, while paying for the entire K-12 education of the children in Roman Catholic schools.

And so, we ask again: how is this fair in 2024? How does open, though legally-protected discrimination not offend the conscience of the premier and/or of the Minister of Education? How can Ontario truthfully say that it honours and ensures the equal worth of all its children?

It cannot.

GAJE will fight on. We have instructed our counsel to seek leave to appeal. We will pursue every legal avenue, until the end.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom

Am Yisrael Chai

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

September 13, 2024

On May 14, 2024, the Ministry of Education updated its memorandum to schools and to the public on Creating safe and accepting schools: resources for schools and school boards. The memorandum – on the ministry’s website – contains nine parts, the fifth of which deals with “Bullying detection and prevention”.

This section on bullying states: “School boards should use these strategies to prevent and address incidents of bullying at school and to foster a positive learning environment.” It then directs readers to two specific policies on the subject.

• Policy/Program Memorandum 144: Bullying Prevention and Intervention and,

• Bullying – we can all stop it – a guide for elementary and secondary students.

Program Memorandum 144, is a substantive, even fastidious, procedural document that sets down a comprehensive administrative framework for school staff and administrators. It was published on May, 2021 and updated July 24, 2023.

Bullying – we can all stop it, is an in-depth, highly readable, introductory primer on the subject of bullying. It was published November 13, 2019 and updated May 1, 2024.

This was the institutional educational background against which Toronto high school student, Hannah Schwartz, last summer, bravely wrote her letter published in the Toronto Star, that decried the blatant discrimination and constant bullying she suffered in her school because on account of her religion. “What many people may not know,” she wrote, “is that right now it’s hard to be a Jewish kid at just about any school in Canada.” (See the GAJE update July 12, 2024.)

It is important to point out that Hannah experienced the bullying despite the existence of the two Education ministry policies on bullying.

Hannah was courageous and eloquent in describing some of her harrowing experiences. “Before the Israel-Hamas war broke out, I didn’t fully realize what antisemitism was. I knew it as an abstract thing, but I had never come face to face with it myself. Then Oct. 7 arrived and everything changed. I began to notice small hurtful comments from my peers about my religion and culture, and then bigger more painful comments. One of my peers started calling me “Jew” instead of my name. They thought it would be funny to scream it at me in the hallways. And then another told me: “I wish Hitler was back,” and “I wish your whole family had died in a gas chamber.” 

“…The bullying and Jew hatred is hard enough but what is almost just as hard to see is the impact this experience has had on my friends. I notice that some of my Jewish classmates who were once proud of their identity now feel uncomfortable with it. They are scared to be “too” Jewish in public. And for those of us who are proud to be Jewish and show it, many of our peers shun us.”

With youthful, guile-free candor, Hannah concluded her letter with a plea to civil society to help bring about an end to bullying, intimidation and erasure. “…(T)he response from school leaders and politicians feels quiet, like the whole country is a bystander to this bullying. This feels so wrong, like a betrayal of the lessons we were raised on….Yes, we need to be safe from hate and violence. But there’s something we need just as much, now more than ever. We need allies, not bystanders.”

Enrollment in elementary and high schools has increased this year from last by more than 200 students. This is the fourth consecutive year that enrollment in Jewish schools has increased. But it is likely true, given the published testimonies by students and parents (See: Hannah Schwartz’ letter) and reports of the in-creeping and adoption of antisemitic notions and tropes into school board policies (See: the debates surrounding APR) that some Jewish students are departing public schools, at least in part, because they and their parents wish to avoid having to contend with the menace of antisemitism.

Thus, this week when all children have returned to their public schools, GAJE recalls and reiterates Hannah’s brave, clarion plea. It feels like “the whole country is a bystander to this bullying”.

We do not wish to hear the cliched nostrums that politicians and others in leadership positions prefer to utter such as: “There is no place in Canada for racism, antisemitism….” Or, “Canadians are better than this….”. Such words are the quick, vacuous, sound-byte proclamations that mean essentially, nothing.

School leaders and politicians, including the Minister of Education must actually act to ensure antisemitic bullying specifically is eliminated from public schools and public spaces. Yet, there were no back-to-school pronouncements this week by politicians and especially by the Minister of Education, warning against a reversion to or re-embrace of antisemitic behaviour in our schools, in school playgrounds or on our streets. This is much the pity, for the sake of the youngsters who will once again feel unsafe and unwanted in the halls of Ontario’s schools and indeed, for the sake of Ontario, whose society is also being targeted by the haters who target Jews.

We hope the Minister of Education will at least enforce the ministry’s own policies to eliminate intimidation in schools, ie, Bullying – we can all stop it, and Program Memorandum 144.

That is not too much to ask of the government. And that would be a good start.

•••

The appeal by the Government of Ontario of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s refusal last summer to throw out GAJE’s application for fairness in educational funding, was heard in early June by a panel of three judges. The court reserved its decision.

GAJE will publish the court’s decision as soon as it is known to us.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom

Am Yisrael Chai

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

September 6, 2024

The school year returns next week for most students of all ages. It is an exciting and nerve-wracking time for many of our children. But with a loving hug, friendly pat on the back and timely words of encouragement, the kids seem always able to get past the first-day butterflies.

It will not be the same, however, for the institutions and ordinary folk to get as easily past the anti-Jewish, anti-Israel and anti-democracy actions and demonstrations that have been reported to await the post-summer return to the routine rhythms of our society. Campus protesters have rolled up their tents. But they prepare to unfurl other flags of hatred and to incite behaviours entirely antithetical to core western values.

It is therefore important that GAJE supporters and readers of this update be made aware of a newly formed, widely based group that is determined to fight antisemitism and, in the process, stand up for and to protect western values. We should know that there are others – indeed many others – who recognize that the fight against antisemitism is also a fight on behalf of democracy. Thus, as a form of public service announcement, GAJE brings to its supporters, news of the recent formation of the Alliance of Canadians Combatting Antisemitism (ALCCA). (The following information is from the Coalition’s website.)

ALCCA is “a coalition of 28 organizations and many more individuals dedicated to combatting the unprecedented levels of antisemitism in Canada. Each member organization brings expertise and dedication – and a great deal of voluntarism – to our work. The coalition includes:

Honest Reporting Canada, Jewish Educators and Families Association (JEFA), Secure Canada, StandWithUs (Canada), Bring Love (A Catholic organization), Temple Sinai, Lawyers for Secure Immigration, Human Rights Action Group, Canadian Jewish Advocacy (CIJA), StartUp Nation, Hillel Ontario, Allied Voices for Israel (AVI), Canadian Union of Jewish Students (CUPS), Holy Blossom Temple, Lawyers Combating Antisemitism, Council of Muslims Against Antisemitism, End Jew Hatred, Network of Engaged Canadian Academics (NECA), Canadian Women Against Antisemitism (CWAA), Canadian Antisemitism Education Foundation (CAEF), Jewish Parents of Ottawa Students Association (JPOSA), Manitoba Israeli Coalition, Jewish Medical Association of Ontario (JMAO), Winnipeg Friends of Israel (WFI), The Jewish Medical Association of British Columbia (JMABC), Ottawa Against Antisemitism, Jewish Physicians Association of Manitoba (JPAM), Association des Médecins Juifs Du  Québec (AMJQ). 

Guided by five principles:
1.      We believe in the power of working together. When Jewish communities and democratic values are at risk, we must coordinate our efforts. Otherwise, we remain ineffective.
2.      We support the IHRA definition of antisemitism. The definition, adopted by many countries including Canada, recognizes that it is not antisemitic to criticize Israel’s government, policies or practices in a manner similar to how other countries are criticized. However, it is antisemitic to demonize Israel, the world’s only Jewish democratic state, and Zionists, who include the vast majority of Jews, without distinction. 
3.      We believe in respectful dialogue with those who disagree with us. But we reject hatred in all its ugly forms, including intimidation, harassment and the celebration of violence or barbarity.
4.      We believe that Canadians have a duty to reject all forms of extremism. This is not just a “Jewish” issue, it is a “Canadian” issue.
5.      We believe that protecting our children, including students in kindergarten to those in universities and colleges is our highest priority. They are entitled to embrace their Jewish identities, without fear. Their voices need to be heard and supported.

“Too many Jews and their allies feel helpless in the face of pervasive, unprecedented antisemitism, hatred and extremism. They don’t know how to respond. At times, they are frustrated by perceived inaction or feel uninformed about what action is being taken or what is effective. All that must change.”

The ALCCA website is: www.alcca.ca

The sie explains how we can stay informed about this stark threat to our society and how we can become involved in the battle to protect it. Let us join the battle. There is strength in numbers. And confidence. And resolve.

•••

The appeal by the Government of Ontario of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s refusal last summer to throw out GAJE’s application for fairness in educational funding, was heard in early June by a panel of three judges. The court reserved its decision.

GAJE will publish the court’s decision as soon as it is known to us.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom

Am Yisrael Chai

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

August 30, 2024

There is strength in numbers, in shared experiences and in the remarkable self-supporting structure of community. Since October 7, we know this and we feel it deeply.

That is one of the key reasons that community professionals here and in the United States have reported a “surge” in attempts by Jews across all ages to seek some sort of community affiliation.

Many are newly seeking a way to discover, enrich and/or sustain their sense of Jewish belonging.

It is therefore not a surprise to read of a new initiative (eJP, August 21, 2024) in Jewish education in the United States that is aimed at bringing more children into Jewish day schools, specifically non-Orthodox Jewish day schools.

The initiative is called the Ronald S. Lauder Impact Inititiave (LII). When stripped to its narrowest definition, it is the latest publicized effort to “raise” more Jews. At the moment, the initiative has launched a pilot program in five schools in four cities in the U.S. It is also being supported by the Israeli government through the Ministry of Diaspora Affairs.

According to the story in eJP, the program is based upon the Lauder Foundation’s work in Eastern and Central Europe, where it supports over 30 Jewish educational institutions. “I have a dream that all Jewish children will be educated to become engaged and proud Jews,” Lauder said in a statement. “In Europe, I helped revitalize Jewish life by building and growing kindergartens, schools and camps. My dream in the U.S. is that Jewish parents will understand that they can make the choice today to secure their child’s Jewish future; Jewish day schools are the best option for creating strong Jewish identities and preparing the next generation of Jewish leaders. Nothing is more important for the future of our children, our grandchildren, and our people.”

Paul Bernstein, the CEO of Prizmah, an umbrella group for Jewish day schools of all denominations, notes that the events of Oct. 7 are affecting the decisions regarding communal involvement by individual Jewish families. He sees increased interest in enrollment in Jewish day schools in response to antisemitism and increased Jewish communal engagement more generally. He added that “the big question for our community right now is how we develop what comes next?”

GAJE agrees. How do we channel the coalescing energy and the steel-hard will within the Jewish community to counter the malevolent ones wishing harm upon us and Israel? Jewish education for as many as possible is inescapably part of what must come next.

The eJP article is available at:

Ronald Lauder-backed initiative looks to boost non-Orthodox Jewish day schools amid enrollment crisis

•••

The appeal by the Government of Ontario of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s refusal last summer to throw out GAJE’s application for fairness in educational funding, was heard in early June by a panel of three judges. The court reserved its decision.

GAJE will publish the court’s decision as soon as it is known to us.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom

Am Yisrael Chai

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

August 23, 2024

It is – or should be – incontrovertible that Jewish education is one of the essential tools for creating Jews who will be knowledgeable about their heritage, proud to belong to their ancient/modern people, secure and joyful in expressing their belonging, and unwavering in standing with the Jewish people.

Such Jews – allied with all peoples who care for and are willing to protect democracy and law-based freedoms – are required to take up the fight against the forces that are intent on negating Jews and the State of Israel. This is the true light in which the current, hateful campaign against Israel being waged by the hard-core anti-Semites and their unwitting, uninformed confederates must be seen. The pro-Hamas crowd has a multiple overlapping target: The State of Israel, Jews, America and democratic rule.                                    

It is in this context that a report in JNS on August 13 of an interim decision by a judge in California adjudicating upon a lawsuit by three aggrieved Jewish students against UCLA, is like a bolt of electricity restoring the recent power outages in moral behaviour by established figures and institutions throughout the western world. GAJE publishes excerpts from the report because of its exceptional and very important nature.

The facts of the UCLA case will sound familiar.

Pro-Hamas demonstrators sent up an encampment on the campus and prevented Jews and other supporters of Israel from having access to parts of the campus which should have been accessible to all students. The university sought an injunction to prevent the lawsuit from proceeding.

Judge Mark Scarsi, of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, rejected the university’s argument. He began his judgment with the following statement of moral astonishment.

“In the year 2024, in the United States of America, in the State of California, in the City of Los Angeles, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith.”

“This fact is so unimaginable and so abhorrent to our constitutional guarantee of religious freedom that it bears repeating, Jewish students were excluded from portions of the UCLA campus because they refused to denounce their faith,” Scarsi continued. “UCLA does not dispute this. Instead, UCLA claims that it has no responsibility to protect the religious freedom of its Jewish students because the exclusion was engineered by third-party protesters.”

Under principles of the Constitution, the University of California, Los Angeles — a public school — “may not allow services to some students when UCLA knows that other students are excluded on religious grounds, regardless of who engineered the exclusion,” the judge continued.

Judge Scarsi issued a preliminary injunction that requires UCLA to stop providing “ordinarily available programs, activities and campus areas” to the entire student body if they become unavailable to certain Jewish students. “How best to make any unavailable programs, activities and campus areas available again is left to UCLA’s discretion,” he wrote.

The judge wrote that because of the encampments, Jewish students—including the three plaintiffs—felt that they had to “disavow” their religious beliefs to move freely on campus and that they “were excluded based of their genuinely held religious beliefs,” in support of the Jewish state, per the judge’s order. (Our emphasis)

The comparison begs to be made with the decision in the U of T encampment case.

The judge decided that the encampment had to be dismantled on the basis of the narrow principles of property law and trespass. In a lengthy, troubling aside however, relying upon questionable authorities, he determined that the slogans, phrases and language of intimidation emanating from the encampment participants aimed primarily at supporters of Israel and other passersby were not necessarily antisemitic. He wrote: “I do not have to determine how these phrases and symbols are being used. I review this history and analysis merely to point out that the automatic conclusion that those phrases are antisemitic is not justified; especially not on an interlocutory injunction.” (Our emphasis)

This statement by the judge in the U of T case is simply unreconcilable with reality and truth.

What we felt then about the encampments and feel still today was succinctly summarized by Mark Rienzi, a lawyer representing the Jewish students in the UCLA case. “Shame on UCLA for letting antisemitic thugs terrorize Jews on campus. Today’s ruling says that UCLA’s policy of helping antisemitic activists target Jews is not just morally wrong but a gross constitutional violation. UCLA should stop fighting the Constitution and start protecting Jews on campus.”

With university resuming in two weeks, it is incumbent upon the community to prepare for what will surely be a resumption of vile anti-Israel and anti-Jewish activities. In age-appropriate ways, schools must prepare their students. Parents must prepare their children, to know and to celebrate their Jewishness.

•••

The appeal by the Government of Ontario of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s refusal last summer to throw out GAJE’s application for fairness in educational funding, was heard in early June by a panel of three judges. The court reserved its decision.

GAJE will publish the court’s decision as soon as it is known to us.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom

Am Yisrael Chai

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

August 16, 2024

The disbelief, shock and anger felt by Jews, as a result of the very public and very brazen manifestations of anti-Jewish, anti-Israel hatred, have generated consultations and group discussions in Jewish homes, synagogues, schools and office boardrooms at home and abroad. What is the best way to deal with the outrageous affronts to Jewish life?

Within the wide swath of opinions among professionals and “ordinary” folk regarding the path ahead, there is wide consensus on one preferred course of action as a rebuke to the anti-Semites. Lisa Popik Coll and Gail Norry, Prizmah Board Chair and Vice Chair, respectively, expressed it succinctly.  “The best way to fight antisemitism is with Jewish pride and Jewish joy.”

Coll and Norry wrote this prescription in an article entitled, “The next billion-dollar gift” – discussed in this space two weeks ago – that urged philanthropists to try to make Jewish education entirely affordable, if not free, for families that seek it for their children. Their bold suggestion has attracted positive attention. 

Rabbi Moshe Hauer, Executive Vice President of the Orthodox Union, agreed that Jewish education can indeed benefit by the boost that such “transformative philanthropy” would provide. (See “Transformational gifts for our schools and homes”, eJP, July 22)

In an essay that appeared on the eJP website last week,Rachel Mohl Abrahams, senior advisor for education grants and programs at the Mayberg Foundation, also placed her imprimatur of support upon the Coll, Norry proposal. In “Investing in transformational Jewish day school experiences”. But she went even further pleading for generous philanthropy to ensure access to Jewish schools as well as the best outcomes possible from those schools.

“Philanthropy plays a critical role in ensuring that students enter day schools, and that families can afford for their children to stay there…We need to [also] guarantee that the education provided, impacts students’ lives, and especiallytheir connection to Judaism.”

To be sure, Abrahams wrote about specific programs and approaches at the Mayberg Foundation where she is an advisor, in addition to buttressing the general importance, if not urgency, to bring as many children to Jewish education. She extolled certain dedicated teacher training programs sponsored by the foundation aimed at helping develop the best teachers possible.

“The best educators help students make Judaism applicable to their lives in engaging, contemporary and customizable ways, and advancing excellence in the field of day school education depends upon a vigorous commitment to ongoing professional growth of teachers and school leaders. If we want our classrooms to be places of relevance, acceptance and spiritual nourishment, we must invest in the people who have committed their lives to the holy work of Jewish education”, Abrahams wrote.

“Funders… can convey a clear expectation that Jewish education delivers a package of foundational wisdom, values and relationship building that empowers every student and builds positive Jewish identity, in addition to providing skills training and exposing students to Jewish texts. We need to partner with one another and with professionals.” 

Abrahams reinforces the need to “raise” our children knowledgeable about their Judaism if they are to be able to stand up to the haters of Israel and of Jews. Raising our children Jewishly requires excellent Jewish education. And so, she urges the philanthropic world to invest in local and national Jewish educational infrastructure with educator training to create the best Jewish education possible.

GAJE shares Abrahams’ views. And that is why we call readers’ attention to her article. She has elegantly re-iterated the prescription for contending with the modern Jewish condition. 

The Abrahams article is available at:

Investing in transformational Jewish day school experiences

•••

The appeal by the Government of Ontario of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s refusal last summer to throw out GAJE’s application for fairness in educational funding, was heard in early June by a panel of three judges. The court reserved its decision.

GAJE will publish the court’s decision as soon as it is known to us.

•••

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.

•••

Shabbat shalom.

Am Yisrael Chai.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

August 9, 2024

The times weigh heavily upon us. Constant and unabating are our worries for the State of Israel and for our co-religionists wherever their habitations, including here, in our own community.

As these words were written, the bloodlusting cries from the theocratic regime in Iran and from their confederate purveyors of hate, far and wide, increase in shrill crescendo. Two of their appointed masterminds of murder met justice this week. And the mullahs demand vengeance.

So too do haters of Jews and of Israel around the globe. They, and their exploited, uninformed fellow travellers, shout their false slogans, deface public and private property and try to intimidate those who oppose them.

That the displacement of historical truth by lies and of fundamental, human morality by brazen, immorality has been so enthusiastically embraced is infuriating, and as we have noted, worrying.

Rabbi Marc D. Angel, founder of the New York based “study hall”, The Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals, offers the following insights on overcoming anti-Jewish demagogues and bullies trying to take over our institutions and our streets:

“When societies allow hatred to flourish, they are sowing the seeds of their own destruction. When universities, media and political forums condone blatantly anti-Jewish intimidation and violence, the infection spreads well beyond Jews. Civil discourse is threatened. Respectful dialogue is quashed.

“All who stand for a civil society must not be intimidated by the haters, bullies and supporters of terrorism. The syndrome of hate eats away at the foundations of society. It must not be allowed to prevail.”

“To combat this ideology of hatred, we need more than Holocaust education. We need a powerful, positive presentation of Jewish history, Jewish connection to the land of Israel, Jewish idealism, and Jewish striving for peace and mutual understanding.

“We combat anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism by acting with pride, courage…and success. The stronger we are as a community, the more we overcome the hatred and violence of our enemies.”

In other words, to follow Rabbi Angel’s advice, we best oppose the haters by affirming our values and our identity as committed Jews, who cherish and care for our free, democratic, law-based way of life. And to do that we must raise our children to know who they are and what role they might play in the constantly unfolding line of their Jewish peoplehood.

To equip his readers with the facts concerning the history of modern Israel, Rabbi Angel posted a Conversation Guide: Building Support for Israel and Combating Antisemitism with Non-Jewish Friends, Neighbors and Colleagues.

We point out with great pride that the guide was written by Jeffrey Stutz, one of the founding members of GAJE. It is an excellent source of material that can inform a discussion with Jews and non-Jews alike.

The guide can be accessed and downloaded at: https://www.jewishideas.org/node/3230

•••

The appeal by the Government of Ontario of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s refusal last summer to throw out GAJE’s application for fairness in educational funding, was heard in early June by a panel of three judges. The court reserved its decision.

GAJE will publish the court’s decision as soon as it is known to us.

•••

If you wish to contribute to GAJE’s lawsuit for fairness in educational funding in Ontario, 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.

Am Yisrael Chai.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

August 2, 2024

Earlier this month, Lisa Popik Coll and Gail Norry, board chair and vice chair, respectively, of Prizmah: Center for Jewish Day Schools cast a challenge to the wide Jewish community of North America of high Richter scale magnitude and potential benefit.

Citing the recent previously unimaginable philanthropy by Ruth Gottesman who donated $1 billion to cover medical school tuition for students at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and by Michael Bloomberg in the same amount to cover medical school tuition for students at Johns Hopkins Medical School, Coll and Norry askied the very bold question: “What if the next billion-dollar gift went to Jewish day school tuition?”   

In an article published by eJP, entitled The next billion-dollar gift, the authors noted that Gottesman justified her remarkable act of generosity as a way to make medical school education available for students “whose economic status is such that they wouldn’t even think about going to medical school.”  

Why not adopt that very same approach to enable families who couldn’t even think about being able to send their children to Jewish school, the authors urged.

It is not surprising that Coll and Norry have put this formerly out-of-the-box question on the Jewish communal agenda. They were inspired by the eye-catching generosity of Gottesman and Bloomberg, and compelled by the imperative to act urgently in the face of the current context of rising threats to Jewish life, at home and abroad.

They explain their thinking plainly and honestly.

“A year ago, few of us could also have imagined the wave of unbridled antisemitism that has hit since Oct. 7 and its effects on every aspect of our lives, especially education. We believe the best way to fight antisemitism is with Jewish pride and Jewish joy. We need to raise a generation of strong, proud, knowledgeable, literate and unapologetic Jews, and there is no better way to do this than Jewish day school.

“But antisemitism should not be the only reason that families enroll in Jewish day schools. All Jewish families, from every denomination and at every level of observance, should understand that they can find a community and educational home at Jewish day schools.”

And so, the authors, ask with a pleading and hopeful heart, for the next billion-dollar gift by a civic-minded, Jewish philanthropist intent on improving the world, to be made to embed Jewish education permanently into the deep infrastructure of Jewish communal life.

GAJE agrees with the authors. Now more than ever.

Perhaps a continent-wide communal summit is warranted on the subject of making Jewish education truly affordable for all?

•••

The Coll/Norry article is available at:

The next billion-dollar gift

•••

The appeal by the Government of Ontario of Judge Eugenia Papageorgiou’s refusal last summer to throw out GAJE’s application for fairness in educational funding, was heard in early June by a panel of three judges. The court reserved its decision.

GAJE will publish the court’s decision as soon as it is known to us.

•••

If you wish to contribute to GAJE’s lawsuit for fairness in educational funding in Ontario, 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.

Am Yisrael Chai.

Grassroots for Affordable Jewish Education (GAJE)

July 26, 2024