We should be partners: Public schools & local Orthodox share means, ends

It is evident to anyone who regularly follows the news in the state of New Jersey that our public schools are imperiled. First and foremost, the schools face dwindling financial support from state government.

At the same time, the schools are constrained by legislative mandates that place an increasing number of regulations on reporting, policy, and other matters.

Recent state legislation also put a 2% cap on possible local property tax increases, regardless of the needs of specific local schools.

Meanwhile a struggling national economy forces families to look for any opportunity to constrain their spending, which may have the effect of increasing ‘No’ votes in local school board elections.

Add to this mix the financial and, at times, legal exigencies that local charter school efforts present to the public schools and you have the potential for a serious crisis.

Yet despite these pressing challenges the public schools often do not make use of all the resources of their local community. As I’ve observed in my hometown of Highland Park, and as I suspect may be true in other towns throughout the state as well, with rare exceptions there is little formal contact between members of the Orthodox community and the leadership of the public schools. And that is a serious lost opportunity to both sides.

The Orthodox Jewish community is blessed to have members who are talented professionals with considerable skills in accounting, business, fundraising, law, and other fields. Surely some of the people, given the right opportunity for involvement, could suggest and support novel initiatives that would help the schools better weather the severe financial and regulatory storms they face.

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Considering the other side of the equation, I would assert that Orthodox Jews have a serious stake in the success of their local public schools.

As observant Jews my wife and I decided to send our daughter to a yeshiva, a Jewish parochial school. This was a personal choice, based on our firmly held religious beliefs.

Our religious beliefs also direct us to concern ourselves with the welfare of the town in which we reside. This outward-directed concern is not chiefly motivated by an interest in maintaining high property values. While this is a significant economic factor to consider, in this perspective the schools are really only secondary to the benefit they can provide to us.

Nor is our concern for the public schools animated solely by an interest in fostering a safer town. While virtuous, a concern for schools rooted only in safety interests is largely focused on preventing bad things (crime) and not on any desired positive outcome.

For my wife and me, and others we know, the imperative to support our local schools comes out our deep-seated recognition that some of the values we espouse most deeply as Orthodox Jews are not particular to our faith.

Judaism places education as one of the highest values in our faith. In part this reflects the need to ensure effective transmission of our religious values to the next generation. But this essential drive is also wedded, in many of our local religious schools, with a strong dedication to secular studies.

The dual commitment is based on the understanding that for our youth to succeed in the world, faith is not enough. Our youth need the tools to meaningfully interpret the world around them, navigate through it, identify a proper path for livelihood, and most importantly to find appropriate opportunities to contribute to the greater good.

If we make sacrifices so that our daughter and her peers in religious school have these tools, then it is only fair that we recognize, respect, and support the value of these tools for ALL the children of our town. To do anything less would be to embrace our own need at the expense of the larger world.

Jewish scholars and teachers throughout the centuries have recognized the stake their co-religionists have in the common welfare (see, for instance, Maimonides' Laws of Kings, chapter 10). In our era, and in this country, which so wisely provides for the education of all youth regardless of faith or economic status, our Jewish concern for the common good must, by necessity, extend to public education.

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As I see it, the need and opportunity for vigorous cooperation between public schools and their local Orthodox Jewish communities is clear and compelling. It is my hope that our local public schools and their active supporters in our community will find new ways to forge meaningful and long-lasting connections with the local Orthodox community. Both communities could greatly benefit from such a partnership.

Harry Glazer, a communications professional and former synagogue leader, lives in Highland Park.