More Options for Jewish Day School Education

According to this Forward article, New York’s first Hebrew language public school has been approved, and will open its door in August 2009.  The school, to be known as the Hebrew Language Academy, will be organized as a charter school, publicly funded but operated by a private not-for-profit association.

Those who follow me on Altneuland and Cafe Birkenreis will know that I am a long-standing advocate of Jewish day schools, provided that they are of an inclusive and pluralistic or (as in this case) secular nature.  (To be more specific, not a-religious or anti-religious, but respecting all “ways” to Judaism, as well as the separation between church and state.)

The entire article is worth reading in a quiet moment, but I wanted to highlight the following extract:

Our instincts tell us to reject separate schools for their damage to diversity. The fight for an open society has served us well.

But these are extraordinary times. America has become a nation of tribes, self-segregating in separate neighborhoods by income, political views and lifestyle as well as by race or religion. The Internet is turning casual encounters at the bookstore and post office into a thing of the past. We don’t even hear the same news. These changes are bigger than ideology, and they won’t disappear any time soon.

In this new world, chasing after an elusive civic republican utopia may be a fool’s errand. Whatever damage we fear the Hebrew charter school might inflict on the American mosaic — or what’s left of it — could be outweighed by its promise to the Jewish future.

The driving force behind the Hebrew Language Academy was mega-philanthropist Michael Steinhardt.

Technorati Tags: Day school, Diaspora, Education