Education Or Mis-Education - Miss Education

I was linked by a beloved friend to an article in a blog about why Modern Orthodox yeshivos are different than Brisk and shouldn't learn kodshim [shhhh! Don't tell Rav Y.B. S. that. He wouldn't like it:-)] I won't link you to the article because this site has links to other sites that contain pornography, heresy, mockery, lashon hara etc. etc.

 וגדול המחטיאו יותר etc.

[While I was there, I learned that a woman rabbi was appointed in Efrat. Well, they don't CALL her "Rabbi", but she serves his functions. I will be careful what I write because I think I know who paid for it:-)].

I will also not relate to the thesis of his article because I think it is ridiculous on a number of levels and doesn't deserve my time or yours [although I am sure that the author is well meaning and Jews are allowed to disagree].

But as a 25 year veteran of MO Jewish education dealing with American students, I will use this as a platform to comment on what REALLY needs to be done with the system.

Parents invest HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS [that could be otherwise spent on important things like vactions in Miami or overly extravagant simchas...] to educate their children and after 12 years they received almost nothing for their money. The vast majority of kids I have dealt with cannot read a pasuk in Chumash without an English translation and certainly not a Rashi on the pasuk. Parnassa for Artscroll but a sign of illiteracy. Not to mention the students' inability to read a mishna or a daf gemara. Sudents don't know many of the basic stories and laws in the Chumash and haven't even heard of many of the sfarim of Nach. I have seen this thousands of time and still can't get over it.

Is anything being done about this?

So the solution is not to avoid teaching Kodshim but to start .... teaching. I am not faulting the teachers, I am not faulting the students, I am not faulting the parents. I am faulting nobody. If I have to blame someone it will be Obama because we already criticize him so much, what will one more criticism hurt him. But something must be done so that a child's education doesn't begin in December of his shana aleph.

I am no longer in the system. More time to learn for me and only a slight decrease in salary from being paid next to nothing to being paid nothing - so I am "cool" [meaning "I'm good" - אני מנסה ללמוד סלנג אמריקאי עדכני!]. I also don't send my kids to MO schools in the US [for at least two reasons]. But my heart cries for all of the yiddeshe neshamas that are thirsting for Torah and instead are being malnourished by Facebook and the Yankees [this being said as a recovering Mets fan. Is Mazzilli still playing? Why does the 1980 gold medal of the US Olympic Hockey team still get me excited? Maybe all of the achdus and hugging:-)] 

This is not a matter of Modern Orthodoxy vs. Charedi Orthodoxy. It is an matter of teaching our children about our heritage and giving them the tools to be fluent in our literature. If on the way the kids also acquire a belief in G-d and His Torah - even better:-).

Bi-ahava rabba,
Me:-)