Orthodox Jewish schools will have to admit non-Jewish pupils within the next five years to fill empty places, according to the first full report of the Commission On Jewish Schools, which is published today.
The report finds much to celebrate in Jewish education, notably a surge in popularity that will see primary and secondary school pupil numbers rise by 10 per cent next year. However, it warns that both schools and the community should prepare for the inevitable.
It identifies schools in Redbridge, Essex, as most at risk of having to take non-Jewish pupils, and sets out in stark terms what it believes the East London community must do to save its schools and, arguably, its own long-term future.
Commission chair Professor Leslie Wagner told the JC: “We are worried that the number of places in secondary education beyond 2010 may not be filled by Jewish pupils. It is likely that one or more of our secondary schools will be taking non-Jewish pupils and we address that in the report.
“Schools should not stumble into the issue. They need to think through what it means and how they organise their school, whether it is children not taking Jewish studies, or whether or not they will be involved in assemblies or discussing Jewish festivals and themes.”
Prof Wagner reported “varied responses” to the prospect of a non-Jewish influx.
“It has already happened in Birmingham, Liverpool, Glasgow and at Simon Marks here in London. Because it doesn’t involve social issues at primary level, people will say that is the price we have to pay to have a Jewish school.
“At secondary level, there is an issue about mixed relationships, about which some people are relaxed and some are not.”
The commission’s 82-page report is released only days after a High Court judge rejected an attempt by the father of a boy whose mother was a Progressive convert to win a place at JFS. The Kenton school admits only pupils who are halachically Jewish — born of a Jewish mother — or who undergo an Orthodox conversion. Mr Justice Munby reaffirmed that position.
Asked whether the commission’s findings on over-supply flew in the face of the judgment, Professor Wagner replied: “We haven’t gone into the issue of halachic and non-halachic Jews. Our remit was the longer term relationships. If someone applies to JFS, it will go to the local authority and then to the adjudicator. Halachah is not an issue for us.”
The report confirmed predictions made as long ago as 2001 by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research — and repeated at intervals since — about over-supply of places, and confirmed the worst fears of Orthodox schools.
The predictions were made some time before the appearance of the modern Orthodox Yavneh College in Borehamwood and the cross-communal Jewish Community Secondary School in East Barnet.
It is the latter which has caused the commission arguably the greatest anxiety. When JCoSS opens its doors in September 2010, its six forms of entry will mean that mainstream first-year Jewish secondary school places in London will have risen from 680 in 2005 to 1010.
However, whereas an estimated 60 per cent of all Jewish children now attend Jewish schools, that figure would need to rise as high as 89 per cent to fill all the places available.
The commission identified up to 20 per cent of Jewish parents who specifically send their children to non-Jewish secondary schools because they want the best secular education. These affluent and Jewishly observant families were “the hardest to shift to a Jewish secondary school,” Professor Wagner acknowledged.
Educational philanthropist Benjamin Perl — who has been instrumental in the establishment of around 20 Jewish schools, including Yavneh College — applauded the report as “mirroring the facts on the ground. If someone picked it up in a library they would get a very good picture of what’s going on.
“I welcome the appointment of Leo Noé to implement the report’s recommendations and have confidence that he will gather the right people around him,” he added.
But on the question of over-supply, Mr Perl said the commission had been “very mild” about the impact of JCoSS.
“I question the need for JCoSS, despite the fact that I am a great believer in opening more schools, because the feeder schools in Borehamwood will continue to send their children to Yavneh.
“It will not have a local constituency or a local infrastructure. You cannot impose a school on a locality. I do not see the need for JCoSS purely on numbers, and not on religious grounds.”
In Manchester, Joshua Rowe, chairman of governors at King David High School, said the local problem was the reverse of London, with primary schools struggling to fill their places and a waiting list for the secondary school.
“The question we must ask ourselves is ‘what happened?’ How did our schools empty like this?
“It is what the late Chief Rabbi, Lord Jakobovits, and his successor Sir Jonathan Sacks have said — that too many people have married out and assimilated.
“The post-war community built grand synagogues but did not build schools. Now the synagogues are empty and the community is in decline. We have to reverse that.”
The people who produced the report
Professor Leslie Wagner:
University of Derby Chancellor and former Chancellor of Leeds Metropolitan University
Sarah Anticoni:
Solicitor/mediator who has children at a Jewish school
Bill Benjamin:
Managing director of a large private-equity firm and vice-chair of the Assembly of Masorti Synagogues
Tony Danker:
Management consultant with lengthy communal involvement
Tamara Finkelstein:
A director at the Treasury and an active member of New North London Synagogue
Aviva Kaufmann:
A mother-of-three involved in formal and informal Jewish education
Jon Kestenbaum:
Chief executive of the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts and former head of the Chief Rabbi’s office
Professor Kate Loewenthal:
Academic psychologist
Ivan Lewis:
Bury South MP and a Health Minister
Leo Noé:
Active participant in education strategy
Gerald Rothman:
A former Leo Baeck College chairman who is married to a Reform rabbi