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The sanctity of decoding: Reframing Hebrew literacy in the United States and Europe
Author(s): Badder, Anastasia; Avni, Sharon
Date: 2024
Topics: Hebrew, Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Jewish Texts and Text Study, Teaching and Pedagogy, Language, Main Topic: Education
Abstract: Aims and Objectives: This article explores the challenges Jewish children face in educational programs teaching about Judaism and Jewish culture located in the United States and Europe. Students learn to decode Hebrew but not to read for comprehension, which conflicts with other types of literacy learning they encounter throughout their education in school and at home. Methodology: The study is based on long-term participant observation at two religious education programs, one in the United States and one in Luxembourg. Data and Analysis: A language socialization lens was applied to coded fieldnotes to bring findings into conversation with each other. Findings: Following initial frustrations stemming from a mismatch between American and European schooled literacy expectations and Hebrew decoding, students came to understand Hebrew as a distinctive sacred language. This allowed them to reconceptualize decoding as a successful and meaningful form of literacy and to see themselves as competent Hebrew users and members of a broader Jewish community. Originality: Existing studies primarily focus on sacred languages and literacies oriented around supporting connections with the divine. This study contributes to the existing body of work by illustrating religious literacy education aimed at cultivating communal and religious identification. Implications: This study provides evidence that decoding of sacred texts without comprehension of lexico-semantic content can be a meaningful form of literacy that enables religious members to affirm and do community without explicit reference to divine relations. It argues for a distinctive form of bilingualism in which the sacred language and talk about it work together to create meaningful religious learning.
Preserving Jewish Identity Without Returning to the Ghetto: A Case Study of the École Maïmonide, France's First Jewish Secondary School, 1935–2022
Author(s): Voignac, Joseph
Date: 2024
Topics: Jewish Schools, Jewish Education, Jewish Identity, Main Topic: Education
Abstract: This article analyzes the history of France's first Jewish secondary school: the École Maïmonide, from its founding in Paris in 1935 to the present day. With close to 1,500 pupils today, it has become one of France's largest Jewish schools. Born out of a fear that exclusive reliance on secular French public education could lead to the inexorable erosion of Jewish religious practice and culture in France, the École Maïmonide was designed to provide French Jews with a Jewish alternative to the State's lycées, where pupils could follow a solid Jewish studies program alongside a high-quality general studies syllabus. While such a project implied a degree of separation from mainstream French society, the École Maïmonide's founders remained committed to public education for the majority of Jewish youth and the full integration of their pupils into French society. Analyzing the ways in which these aspirations materialized in the school's day-to-day organization and how the balance between them evolved throughout its history, this case study seeks to further our understanding of the history of Jewish education in France as well as the evolution of the discourse on identity preservation within the French Jewish community.
Jidisze Mame. Two Biographies of Polish Jewish Women
Author(s): Cukras-Stelągowska, Joanna
Date: 2023
Topics: Motherhood, Age and Generational Issues, Jewish Education, Jewish Continuity, Main Topic: Other, Oral History and Biography, Religious Observance and Practice, Family and Household, Interviews
Abstract: The article presents the biographies of representatives of the third postwar generation of Polish Jews. It attempts at reconstructing the experiences of becoming a religious Jew, choosing a Jewish path in adolescence where there is no or incomplete transmission of intergenerational cultural heritage in the family of origin. The two women's biographies were analysed in terms of independent acquisition of cultural (religious) knowledge and the possibilities and limitations of Jewish education in our country. The research was carried out based on the biographical method and unstructured/ in-depth interviews (2018-2022). Exemplifications in the form of the two biographies serve to distinguish the stages of "becoming a religious Jew and mother" in the "found generation", to show individual biographical events and common biographical sequences (mostly educational and parental).
Aporetic differences? Equality entitlements, religious schools, and contours of protection
Author(s): Kasstan, Ben
Date: 2023
Topics: Jewish Schools, Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education, Orthodox Judaism, Haredi / Strictly Orthodox Jews, Anthropology, Ethnography, Jewish - Non - Jewish Relations, Religion and State, Sex Education
Abstract: The requirement for schools in England to implement equality education has led religious conservative minorities to voice a conflict between legally protected characteristics of religion and sexual orientation. Drawing on long-term ethnographic engagement with Jewish orthodoxies in England, the article critiques these apparent aporetic differences by tracing the grammars of protection that are fielded by custodians of state governance and religious conservativism in public disputes and how particular grammars of protection are rendered authoritative over others. The article excavates how the staging of authoritative grammars of protection by state and religious conservative actors forecloses an understanding of the subject-positions that manoeuvre at the sidelines to integrate ways of being and protect a space for difference. Through the framing of an arm-wrestle, the article critiques negotiations over policy and legal reform as it is grasped in social worlds, and explores how state and religious conservative actors move within the conventions of secular liberal governance to maintain their authority and stakes amidst challenges to continuity.
Teachers’ conceptions of Orthodox Jewish education in relation to religious nurture in a liberal society
Author(s): Wilson, Nissan
Date: 2022
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Teachers, Orthodox Judaism, Jewish Schools, Jewish Studies, Jewish Education
Abstract: The indoctrination charge has been levelled at religious studies teachers who teach controversial propositions as fact (see for example Snook, 1972; Hand, 2004). On this view, indoctrination takes place when the process which brings children to believe controversial propositions bypasses their rational autonomy. Taking into account the above argument and the proposed responses, my study goes beyond the arena of normative philosophy and looks at teachers’ conceptions of their role, asking whether they experience tensions between their mission as religious studies teachers and the values of the Western, liberal polity in which they live. I focus on a unique subset of Orthodox Jewish schools, where the schools’ religious ethos appears to be at odds with many of the parent body who are not religiously observant, and I ask to what extent religious studies teachers take parental wishes into account in choosing what and how to teach their subject. Using grounded theory methods in a critical realist paradigm, field work takes the form of in-depth interviews with religious studies teachers in the above group of schools. Working from initial codes to higher levels of theoretical abstraction led to clear findings on teachers’ conceptions of their role and their response to the indoctrination charge. For the purposes of their role at least, religious studies teachers describe religion using the language of the market and getting pupils to “buy-into the product” rather than necessarily to believe its propositions as true. As a corollary to this, participants see autonomy as having to do with choice, rather than with rationality, suggesting that while scholars, in their critique of religious nurture view a rationalist conception of autonomy based on Kant as the dominant paradigm, in the real world (of my research field at least) a more existentialist Millian conception sets the terms of the discourse.
"Wann haben wir die erste Rabbiner?": jüdische Studien als Wissenschaft und als Politikum - Erfahrungen aus Deutschland und Perspektiven für die Schweiz
Translated Title: "When will we have the first rabbis?": Jewish studies as a science and as a political issue - experiences from Germany and prospects for Switzerland
Author(s): Bodenheimer, Alfred
Editor(s): Pfleiderer, Georg; Heit, Alexander
Date: 2012
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Studies, Main Topic: Education, Rabbis
‘I just want you to get into the flow of reading’: Reframing Hebrew proficiency as an enactment of liberal Jewishness
Author(s): Badder, Anastasia
Date: 2022
Topics: Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education, Hebrew, Chedarim / Supplementary Schools, Family and Household, Reform/Liberal/Progressive Judaism
Abstract: Families enroll their children in Luxembourg's Liberal Talmud Torah because they are committed to continuing Jewish tradition and teaching their children how to be Jewish. These families are also deeply attached to liberal modernity and its ideals of free choice and autonomy – ideals that appear to clash with those of Jewishness. Hebrew and Hebrew literacy become key sites through which families resolve this tension. By reframing Hebrew proficiency as requiring decoding but not comprehension students contribute to Jewish continuity and simultaneously maintain a vision of themselves as modern progressives. This reframing is initially frustrating for students as Hebrew literacy practices conflict with schooled expectations for language and literacy; yet students eventually take up and find meaning in these new forms.
A Still Small Voice: Considering the Significance of Teacher Narratives in Contemporary Jewish Education
Author(s): Pomson, Alex D M
Editor(s): Rich, Yisrael; Bar-Lev, Mordekhai; Rosenak, Michael
Date: 1999
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Teachers, Jewish Schools, Main Topic: Education, Narrative, Teaching and Pedagogy
Critical history and collective memory : a problem with Jewish education
Author(s): Pomson, Alex Daniel Martin
Date: 1994
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Jewish Students, Jewish Studies, Jewish Teachers, Jewish History, Teaching and Pedagogy, Curriculum
Abstract: This research has been stimulated by the profound ambivalence which Jewish schools show in deciding whether or how to teach Jewish history. This ambivalence is first examined in the context of a philosophical analysis of the relationship between critical history and other forms of historical consciousness. Finding this approach deficient, a psychological examination of how Jewish students experience the study of Jewish history is proposed. A critical review of research into children's historical thinking leads to the suggestion that alternative research traditions may be more fruitfully employed here. As a result, it is proposed to apply a concept mapping methodology to the investigation of what Jewish students acquire from the critical study of Jewish history. Theoretical problems raised by this proposal are confronted and resolved, and a defensible research strategy is then formulated according to series of explicitly articulated empirical and theoretical assumptions. This culminates in the presentation and description of an instrument for the generation and analysis of conceptual representations of Jewish historical knowledge in cognitive structure. Two case studies are offered. These are followed by a discussion of (1) how these studies might inform debate about the consequences of teaching critical Jewish history in Jewish schools; (2) the possibilities offered by applying a concept mapping methodology to Jewish education in general.
Six takeaways about Jewish life under lockdown
Author(s): Graham, David; Boyd, Jonathan
Date: 2022
Topics: Coronavirus/Covid, Religious Observance and Practice, Jewish Education, Jewish Community, Jewish Organisations, Main Topic: Identity and Community, Surveys
Abstract: Jews in the UK experienced tumultuous change with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020. But what effect did the pandemic and the accompanying lockdowns have on Jewish life, which has always been heavily reliant on in-person social interaction? Based on the responses of 4,000 JPR panel members, a new report by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research explores how Jewish families and the community grappled with this unforeseen and dramatic societal change.

The report, written by Dr David Graham and Dr Jonathan Boyd, charts the sudden proliferation of online Jewish content catering for everything from prayer services to educational activities, the challenges this posed particularly to more halachically-observant Jews, how feelings of attachment to the community were affected by these changes and how confident different groups have felt about the gradual return to a new type of Jewish normal.
«Gehe hin und lerne». Jüdische Bildung und das College der Jüdischen Gemeinde Bern
Translated Title: "Go and learn". Jewish Education and the College of the Jewish Community of Bern
Author(s): Abelin, Peter
Editor(s): Picard, Jacques; Bloch, René
Date: 2014
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education
Religionsunterricht und jüdische Tagesschulen in der Schweiz
Translated Title: Religious education and Jewish day schools in Switzerland
Author(s): Fridman, Leonardo
Editor(s): Picard, Jacques; Gerson, Daniel
Date: 2014
Topics: Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education, Jewish Schools
Prasa społeczności żydowskiej w Polsce i jej edukacyjne zasoby
Translated Title: Press of the Jewish community in Poland and its educational resources
Author(s): Cukras-Stelągowska, Joanna
Editor(s): Kożyczkowska, Adela; Szczepska-Pustkowska, Maria
Date: 2020
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Media, Main Topic: Other, Newspapers, Magazines and Periodicals
Jüdische Kinder- und Jugendbildung in Deutschland seit 1945: Schulungskontexte und Wissensbestände im Wandel
Translated Title: Jewish children and youth education in Germany since 1945: changing educational contexts and bodies of knowledge
Author(s): Springborn, Matthias
Date: 2022
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Main Topic: Education, Jewish Revival, Post-1989, Post-War Reconstruction
Abstract: Diese historische Studie erforscht die Entwicklung jüdischer Bildung für Kinder und Jugendliche in Deutschland seit der Schoah mit einem Fokus auf die Institutionen- und Akteursebene und unter Einbindung von Exkursen in Bildungsmedien. In einem chronologischen Dreischritt werden dabei die Bildungsarbeit jüdischer Displaced Persons-Lager der unmittelbaren Nachkriegszeit, der neugegründeten jüdischen Organisationen und Gemeinden in der Bundesrepublik, sowie die jüngeren Entwicklungen seit der deutschen Wiedervereinigung behandelt. Schlaglichter fallen dabei u. a. auf die Bildungs- und Kulturarbeit jüdischer Hilfsorganisationen in den DP-Lagern, auf Curricula und Schulbücher der DPs, auf die Bedingungen des Wiedereinrichtens jüdischen Religionsunterrichts in den neugegründeten jüdischen Gemeinden, auf die Ferienlager der Zentralwohlfahrtsstelle der Juden (ZWST) oder auf jüdische Kultur- und Schulbuchkommissionen des Zentralrats der Juden im Verbund mit den Rabbinerkonferenzen.
After Covid: The Future of Jewish Education in the UK. A Community Project
Date: 2022
Topics: Coronavirus/Covid, Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Main Topic: Education, Youth Movements
Abstract: Jewish education is at a critical juncture. The experience of Covid-19 has shaken and tested our schools, youth movements and our communal infrastructure. As a community, we have risen to the enormous challenges across the sector.

The question facing educational leaders is how do we ‘build back better’? In June 2021, LSJS and UJIA convened an on-line symposium for Jewish educational leaders, providing a collaborative space to consider that question and develop long-term strategic solutions. Headed by Joanne Greenaway (Chief Executive, LSJS) and Mandie Winston (Chief Executive, UJIA), a steering group from across the Jewish educational sector led this project (see
appendix one).

Drawing on current international research on post-pandemic recovery and opportunity, we shared ideas and emerging models of success, captured learning from our lived experiences and considered how to use them to drive change. We started a critical process which we have subsequently built on to set a new, bold agenda for Jewish education, which crucially, has brought together both the formal and informal education sectors working with up to 25 yearold Jewish young people.

We addressed the unique aspects of Jewish education, in which the interplay between home, school and community is so critical to success. We also needed to understand unique opportunities, like the potential role of our active youth movements and how best to harness it.

Our focus has been twofold. First, we have been considering what is the best Jewish educational response to the cost of Covid, with its psychological impact on our young people and learners. It has placed an enormous stress on teachers, informal educators and all who work with young people in our community. Meanwhile, we have also addressed the lost learning experiences, including two summers of limited engagement and no school Israel trips or Youth Movement Israel Tours.

Second, how do we create opportunity out of the crisis? How might we re-envision our educational organisations? How can we harness the opportunities afforded by new technology and what are its limitations? How have we been impacted by greater global connectedness? How have our young people’s attitudes to learning shifted and what does that mean for the way in which we teach and engage them? How do the informal and formal education sectors
complement or duplicate each other? Are we best supporting and valuing the teachers and educators we entrust with our children and what status do they have in our community?
Академічне дослідження іудаїзму в незалежній Україні
Translated Title: Academic study of Judaism in independent Ukraine
Author(s): Зюзіна, Анна Марія Басаурі
Date: 2013
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Studies, Main Topic: Education, Universities / Higher Education
Ценностное воспитание в еврейской воскресной школе
Translated Title: Values Education in the Jewish Sunday School
Author(s): Шалумова, Р.Н.
Date: 2014
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Chedarim / Supplementary Schools, Values, Jewish Education
Изучение современного иврита в России: многообразие целей и пути их достижения
Translated Title: Study of Modern Hebrew in Russia: Variety of Goals and Ways to Achieve them
Author(s): Кондракова, Юлия Николаевна
Date: 2019
Topics: Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education, Hebrew
Abstract: Анализируются проблемы изучения современного иврита в Российской Федерации. В частности, отмечается, что иврит — язык, изучение которого еще совсем недавно было запрещено или, по крайней мере, весьма ограничено, в настоящее время изучается на всех образовательных уровнях и в самых разнообразных форматах. Иврит преподают на различных языковых курсах, в том числе при разных еврейских организациях, а в последние годы появляется все больше курсов и частных групп, предлагающих пользующуюся все большим спросом услугу изучения иврита в онлайн-формате. В целом, за последние 30 лет в России создана собственная школа преподавания иврита, осуществляется активная научная деятельность, проводятся международные конференции, издается собственный журнал.
Using New Technological Tools to Teach Hebrew as a Second Language in the FSU
Author(s): Agranovsky, Vera; Zaslavsky, Rina; Maryanchik, Evgueny
Date: 2014
Topics: Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education, Hebrew, Teaching and Pedagogy, Teachers, Jewish Schools, Jewish Teachers, Internet
Abstract: The rapid development of technology in the last decade fosters renewed thinking about how it can be harnessed for educational projects in general and for teaching the Hebrew language in particular. The use of technological tools for teaching Hebrew abroad is especially significant. In the former Soviet Union (FSU) countries Hebrew is studied in various frameworks, among them universities, Ulpans (intensive Hebrew language programs) and other adult education courses, Jewish day schools and Sunday schools. This paper will present several projects which use technological tools that contribute to their effectiveness and without which some projects would not be possible.
Фартук, философия, фитнес: о женском образовании в хасидской общине
Translated Title: Family, Philosophy, Fitness: On Female Education in a Chassidic Community
Author(s): Зеленина, Галина Светлояровна
Editor(s): Белова, Ольга
Date: 2018
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Education: Adult Education, Baal Teshuvah, Health, Health Education, Jewish Women, Chabad-Lubavitch
Abstract: Статья посвящена баалот-тшува («вернувшимся» в иудаизм женщинам) в московской общине хасидского движения Хабад Любавич. Их взгляды на свою жизнь, свою роль в семье и общине и отношение руководства любавического движения к женскому вопросу рассматриваются сквозь призму одной конкретной темы – практики регулярного образования для взрослых. Наряду с традиционными уроками Торы и религиозных практик, за которые ответственны женщины (диетарные законы, чистота семейной жизни), Хабад поощряет лекции по здоровому питанию и семейной психологии или занятия фитнесом, с тем чтобы позволить членам общины чувствовать себя современными людьми, сохраняя при этом традиционные ценности и патриархальную иерархию.
Tradicionalitás és innováció – a vallástudomány és a neveléstudomány határán – a zsidó nevelésben
Translated Title: Tradition and innovation - on the border of religion and education - in Jewish education
Author(s): Tóth, Andrea
Date: 2015
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Jewish Teachers, Main Topic: Education
Monoreligious education in a pluralist framework: The case of Jewish RE curriculum in Finland
Author(s): Ubani, Martin
Date: 2012
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Curriculum, Schools: Non-Jewish
Abstract: This report examines the characteristics of Jewish minority RE in Finnish state schools. The article will first describe the Finnish context for Jewish RE and then the characteristics of monoreligious education. Then the article will analyse the curriculum for Jewish RE in Basic Education by comparing it to the general guidelines for RE using qualitative content analysis. The guiding research questions in this research report are: 1. What are the characteristics of Jewish minority Religious Education in Finnish state schools? 2. What are the differences between the Jewish RE and the general curriculum for RE in Finland?
Jewish Education and Identity among London Jews
Author(s): Schmool, Marlena; Miller, Steve
Date: 1994
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Identity, Main Topic: Education
Authenticity, Autonomy, and Authority: Feminist Jewish Learning among Post-Soviet Women
Author(s): Grant, Lisa
Date: 2008
Topics: Education: Adult Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Women, Main Topic: Education, Jewish Identity
Abstract: This articles explores how a group of women in the Former Soviet Union grapple with questions of Jewish identity and Jewish “authenticity” as they participate in adult Jewish learning program that employs methods of feminist pedagogy and transformative learning. The study reflects on areas of dissonance between the transformational learning process and the tenacity of the women's world assumptions that are shaped by background, history, and worldview. While the learning process seems to be prompting these women to seriously and critically reflect on and reframe their self-understanding as learners and as Jews, their limited content-knowledge combined with a tentative sense of personal authority about Jewish life seems to impede their ability to harmonize their learning with a clear sense of what constitutes authentic practice of Judaism.
New Structures of Jewish Education in Germany
Author(s): Glöckner, Olaf
Editor(s): Glöckner, Olaf; Fireberg, Haim
Date: 2015
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Universities / Higher Education, Rabbis, Jewish Education, Education: Adult Education, Limmud
La Religione Degli Ebrei in Italia
Translated Title: The Religion of the Jews in Italy
Author(s): Luzzatto Voghera, Gadi
Date: 2010
Topics: Main Topic: Other, Religious Observance and Practice, Jewish Education
Abstract: In this essay I discuss some historical and cultural paths that led Jews in Italy to transform the perception and practice of their religious tradition over the past two centuries. After a preliminary proposal concerning a definition of the notion of «religion», I identify the tools used by Italian Jewish communities in the field of education and in transforming their rituals. A few paragraphs are then devoted to a few specific events that I believe influenced the understanding and practice of Jewish religion in Italy. The purpose is to give an account of some of the most representative trends of the development of religious observance in present-time Italy.
The Paideia European-Jewish Leadership Program: Graduate Views of Program Contributions and Impacts
Author(s): Katz, Esther; Korazim, Malka
Date: 2012
Topics: Evaluation, Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education
Abstract: Paideia - the European Institute for Jewish Studies in Sweden was created in 2000 as an academic and applied institute of excellence, with the mandate of working for the rebuilding of Jewish life and culture in Europe, and educating for active minority citizenship. It does this through offering an intensive one-year educational program in Jewish Studies directed at future leaders of Jewish life and inter-cultural work. Each year 20-25 participants attend the program, from both Jewish and non-Jewish backgrounds and a variety of European countries. In addition to the one-year Jewish Studies Program, Paideia has also developed activities for its graduates including alumni conferences, educational weekends and Project-Incubator, a two-week summer program to support projects and social innovation across Europe. Project-Incubator was introduced as a follow-up program for alumni, but has expanded its target group beyond graduates. Since its introduction in 2006, the program has developed over 100 different projects. After several years of activity, Paideia decided to conduct an evaluation study to provide a systematic overview of the program's contributions and achievements, and identify unmet needs. The evaluation comprised a follow-up study of all graduates from 2002-2009. This reportpresents the findings of that study. The study findings showed that graduates view the Paideia program as very successful and feel that it contributed to them to a great extent. It was found that all graduates continue to be involved in Jewish activities in their countries of residence. Most report that the program has had an important impact on their professional-life career, on their pursuit of Jewish Studies and on their involvement in Jewish community activities.
German Youth Educational Travel to Israel
Author(s): Ayalon, Yoni; Schnell, Izhak
Date: 2014
Topics: Educational Tours, Israel Tours, Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Identity, Israel Attachment, Israel Education, Israel Experience, Teenagers, Youth, Interviews
Abstract: The article examines the phenomenon of German youth educational tourism to Israel. A qualitative analysis of visits to the main tourist sites in Israel was conducted, and the analysis and interpretation of interviews that were conducted with the youths reflected characteristics of the youths’ sense of a tourist place. The experiences of the German youths in Jerusalem, on the Tel Aviv beach, at memorial sites, in seminars, and in visits to the private homes of Israeli youths blended into a central narrative of creating a reality of a new coexistence that is based on mutual respect between the next generations of Germans and Israelis. We suggest that a reconstruction of identities emerges from the dialectics between the home place of the tourists and the toured places in Israel.
The Impact of German Jewish Youth Educational Travel to Israel on Attitude Change Toward Israel
Author(s): Ayalon, Yoni; Schnell, Izhak
Date: 2020
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Educational Tours, Israel Attachment, Israel Tours, Youth, Teenagers, Israel Experience, Israel Education
Abstract: This article explores the impact of German Jewish youth educational travel in Israel on changing attitudes toward Israel. The travelers are engaged in direct interaction with the host country, directly experiencing the environments and interacting with members of the host society while touring places with symbolic meaning. The encounters with places that were perceived as meaningful encouraged the adolescent youth to emotionally identify with the values of those places and to redefine the role of Israel in the young person’s identity. Consequently, the travelers are expected to improve their attitudes toward Israel as the toured place.
Lifelong learning in synagogues: The forgotten communities
Author(s): Goulden, Simon
Date: 2021
Topics: Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education, United Synagogue, Synagogues, Education: Adult Education
Abstract: Though the development of Jewish schools in the United Kingdom has increased enormously in the past 50 years, the planning of adult Jewish education in the UK has been almost entirely ignored. This article explores the purpose and provision of adult education in three communities in the United Synagogue, the largest synagogal body in the UK. Synagogue-based adult education is apparently provided with little planning or measurement of outcomes. Community leaders and members take differing approaches to its aims and success measurement, with socialization being vital for participants, most of whom are in their senior years.
Le judaïsme allemand (XIXe-XXe siècles) et les écoles rabbiniques en Allemagne aujourd’hui
Author(s): Gonzalés-Vangell, Béatrice
Date: 2019
Topics: Rabbis, Main Topic: Other, Jewish Education
Współczesna, nieformalna edukacja żydowska w Polsce – analiza SWOT
Translated Title: Contemporary informal Jewish education in Poland – a SWOT analysis
Author(s): Antonik, Joanna
Date: 2015
Topics: Evaluation, Informal Education, Jewish Education, Main Topic: Education
Abstract: Celem prezentowanych badań była eksploracja i opis współczesnej edukacji nieformalnej tworzonej przez społeczność żydowską w Polsce. W badaniach uczestniczyło osiem osób (sześć kobiet i dwóch mężczyzn). Rozmówcy i rozmówczynie to osoby aktywne w środowisku żydowskim, wolontariusze/wolontariuszki lub osoby pracujące w instytucjach żydowskich w Polsce. Metodą badawczą było studium przypadku, technikę stanowiły: narracyjny wywiad ekspercki oraz analiza dokumentacji. Badanie przeprowadzono osobiście na terenie Krakowa, Warszawy i Szczecina między majem a październikiem 2013 r. Uzyskane wyniki pozwoliły na ustalenie, kto jest nadawcą i odbiorcą edukacji nieformalnej, jakie treści są przekazywane w procesie edukacyjnym i w jakich formach to następuje. Opisano również motywacje organizatorów i uczestników badań, a także sporządzono analizę SWOT nieformalnej edukacji żydowskiej, która zostanie szczegółowo omówiona w artykule.
Jewish Studies in the FSU: From Scholarship to Social, Cultural and Educational Construction, Regeneration and Growth
Author(s): Parizhsky, Simon
Editor(s): Wygoda, Shmuel; Sorek, Israel
Date: 2009
Topics: Education, Education: Adult Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Studies, Jewish Schools, Jewish Revival, Main Topic: Education, Universities / Higher Education, Jewish Organisations
The Return of Liberal Rabbinic Education to Berlin: Abraham Geiger College, Zacharias Frankel College and the School of Jewish Theology
Author(s): Reich, Eli
Date: 2020
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Revival, Jewish Education, Universities / Higher Education, Rabbis, Reform/Liberal/Progressive Judaism, Conservative / Masorti Judaism
Abstract: In Berlin two rabbinical seminaries, a Reform and Conservative, have recently been established. The historical and intellectual roots of these institutions in the nineteenth century is sketched, and then contrasted with the present curriculum and the religious profile of the students. Some theological questions for the future of these projects conclude the article.
Theorising Jewish social justice education: a hermeneutical inquiry
Author(s): Plen, Matthew
Date: 2020
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Politics, Social Justice
Abstract: Jewish social justice education is an active and growing field of practice, encompassing a diverse range of agendas and practices: teaching Jewish texts and values around issues of refugees, human rights and environmental justice; organising members of the Jewish community to oppose the occupation of the Palestinian territories and support the Israeli Left; advancing gender equality and LGBT+ inclusion within the community through informal education and training; engaging Jewish students in volunteer service-learning projects to alleviate poverty in the developing world; building inter-faith coalitions to work on local agendas such as housing, crime and healthcare; encouraging a culture of charitable giving and volunteering among Jewish young people; and mobilising Jews in the national and international political arenas around issues such as gun violence, climate change, immigration, hate crime and antisemitism. Yet Jewish social justice education remains an under-researched and under-theorised phenomenon. This theoretical lacuna has practical implications for the thousands of educators and activists across the world who are attempting to achieve social justice ends through the medium of Jewish education but have no well thought-out rationale as to what this might mean and, consequently, cannot know if it has any chance of success. This thesis explores possible theoretical foundations for Jewish social justice education by creating a hermeneutical dialogue between Freirean critical pedagogy, Catholic models of social justice education, Jewish social justice literature and interviews with thinkers and practitioners who consider themselves to be part of the Jewish social justice education enterprise. After drawing out and analysing the philosophical, political and educational themes that emerge from this dialogue, I propose three possible directions a coherent normative theory of Jewish social justice education could take: ‘Jewish politics in a renewed public sphere’, ‘Jewish education for relational community building’ and ‘Jewish critical pedagogy for cultural emancipation’.
Inkluzywność oparta na wartościach religijnych w edukacji społeczności żydowskiej w Polsce na przykładzie działalności Stowarzyszenia Żydowskiego Cukunft
Translated Title: Inclusion based on religious values in the education of the Jewish community in Poland on the exampleof the Cukunft Jewish Association’s activism
Author(s): Wilczura, Aleksandra
Editor(s): Humeniuk, Monika; Paszenda, Iwona
Date: 2017
Topics: Main Topic: Other, Jewish Organisations, Jewish Education, Multiculturalism
Abstract: Artykuł prezentuje działania edukacyjne i społeczno-kulturalne o cha-rakterze inkluzywnym prowadzone w Polsce dla społeczności żydowskiej przez jej członków i członkinie zrzeszonych w Stowarzyszeniu Żydowskim Cukunft. Jako świecka organizacja Cukunft w swoich działaniach bazuje na żydowskich wartościach religijnych i kulturowych, z którymi zwraca się zarówno do spo-łeczności żydowskiej, jak i nieżydowskiej (świeckiej, katolickiej, protestanckiej i muzułmańskiej). Dzięki takiemu nowatorskiemu podejściu Cukunft stara się poruszać ważne kwestie społeczne, jak stereotypy, uprzedzenia, dyskryminację i wykluczenie ze względu na wyznanie, afiliację religijną, pochodzenie narodowe i etniczne, wiek, płeć, orientację seksualną i status społeczny. Celem tych działań jest wspieranie polskiego społeczeństwa obywatelskiego otwartego na różnorod-ność i bogactwo kulturowe Polaków należących do różnych grup mniejszościo-wych oraz aktywne przeciwdziałanie wszelkim formom rasizmu, antysemity-zmu, ksenofobii i wykluczenia społecznego. Tego typu podejście w żydowskiej edukacji religijnej pozwala podtrzymać pamięć o żydowskich wartościach kultu-rowo-religijnych i nadać im nową, uniwersalną jakość. Dzięki temu są one nadal obecne w przestrzeni społecznej. Słowa kluczowe: dialog religijny, dyskryminacja krzyżowa, inkluzywność reli-gijna, judaizm, wykluczenie, Żydzi W opracowaniach naukowych dotyczących współczesnego życia żydow-skiego w Polsce przyjęło się uważać, że wraz z upadkiem komunizmu po 1989 roku nastąpił dynamiczny rozwój polskiej społeczności żydowskiej, określany mianem żydowskiego odrodzenia (Jewish Revival) 1. Dowodem tego 1 Tematyką odrodzenia żydowskiego w Polsce po 1989 roku od wielu lat naukowo zajmują się m.in.
Research on the Jewish Community in Polish Social Sciences: Achievements, Perspectives and Scientific Challenges over the Last Two Decades
Translated Title: Badania nad społecznością żydowska w polskich naukach społecznych: osiągnięcia, perspektywy i naukowe wyzwania
Author(s): Cukras-Stelągowska, Joanna
Date: 2018
Topics: Jewish Community, Jewish Identity, Main Topic: Identity and Community, Universities / Higher Education, Jewish Studies, Jewish Education, Jewish Organisations, Psychology, Sociology
Abstract: In my paper, I would like to focus on the achievements of researchers studyingthe Jewish community and culture in Poland. In recent decades, there havebeen numerous publications in this area. It must be admitted that most ofthem are historical works. However, I would like to draw attention to slightlydispersed studies in the field of social sciences (sociology, psychology, peda-gogy). Who are the researchers who deal with Jewish themes? What are thecommon and individual elements of their scientific approaches? Are all ofthese elements part of the discourse of research on the ‘renaissance of theJewish community and identity’? I would like to look at the explorations ofboth researchers connected with the Jewish environment and ‘outsiders’ (in-cluding young foreign researchers interested in Polish Jews). The scope oftheir research is therefore quite diverse and includes issues such as: buildingJewish identity and institutional structures; religious life and the activities ofreligious and secular associations; relations with dominant culture; informaleducation, Jewish education and family upbringing.
‘Marching at the Speed of the Slowest Man’: The Facilitation and Regulation of Student Autonomy in a Pluralist Jewish Day School
Author(s): Samson, Maxim G. M.
Date: 2019
Topics: Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Main Topic: Education, Religious Observance and Practice
Abstract: Faith schools are often perceived as restricting students’ autonomy through inculcating a single religious ideology and compelling participation in collective worship. Based on interviews and focus groups with parents, students and senior staff, this article investigates how England’s one pluralist Jewish secondary school has, in contrast, attempted to accommodate various forms of Jewish practice and facilitate students’ agency to determine their Jewish identities as desired. It reveals that students enjoy opportunities to actively negotiate Judaism, but that their autonomy is not without limits, and issues inherent to pluralism exist in executing an ethos accommodative of diverse, personalized expressions of Jewishness.
Du heder aux écoles actuelles : l'éducation juive, reflet d'un destin collectif
Translated Title: From the Heder to Contemporary Schools: Jewish Education as a Reflection of a Community’s Fate
Author(s): Hazan, Katy
Date: 2002
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Schools, Chedarim / Supplementary Schools
Abstract: This paper shows how from the start of the modern era to today, Jewish education always depended on the successive identity types to which the Jewish minority in France chose to belong. Following the heder of Jewish groups under the Ancien Régime, the consistorial schools followed Emancipation in the face of a concomitant and difficult challenge, namely promoting Jewish individuals in the community while acknowledging each individual’s religious specificity. Primarily a favorite means of regeneration for the poor and immigrants, this means of improvement reached the end of the 1930s in an unhappily weakened state as a result of the success of assimilation and the social secularization of society in general. Between the two world wars but mainly on the eve of World War Two, weaknesses began to appear in French Judaism as a whole along with yearnings for a more religious dimension of Jewish identity as well as a more favorable perspective on Zionism, even if many remained convinced Israelites. These yearnings were manifested in the emerging youth movements, mostly the French Israelite Boy Scouts, and the creation of the Maimonides College in Paris, which during the Occupation, experienced favorable conditions for their growth and the birth of new structures. However, this renewal was transient. Not until the 1960s and even more so in the 1970s did the development of Jewish educational opportunities flourish. The collapse of the French Israelite model was the fundamental cause of this new growth.
Die Jüdische Oberschule in Berlin: Identität und jüdische Schulbildung seit 1993
Translated Title: The Jewish secondary school in Berlin: Identity and Jewish education since 1993
Author(s): Anusiewicz-Baer, Sandra
Date: 2017
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Schools, Schools: Seconday / High Schools, Interviews, Jewish Pupils, Jewish Education, Jewish Identity
Abstract: Als erstes jüdisches Gymnasium in Deutschland nach dem Nationalsozialismus war der Jüdischen Oberschule zur Eröffnung 1993 Aufmerksamkeit gewiss. Die Schule startete mit 27 Kindern. Heute besuchen mehr als 400 junge Menschen das Gymnasium - Zeit, Bilanz zu ziehen und zu fragen, wie die Schule die Identität ihrer Schülerschaft geprägt hat. In ausführlichen Interviews ergründen 23 Ehemalige, was ihnen die Jüdische Oberschule bedeutet. Ergänzt um eine historische Einführung und vier Fallporträts entsteht so das Bild einer einzigartigen Bildungseinrichtung. Sandra Anusiewicz-Baer gelingt zugleich eine Darstellung der Bedingungen und Gestaltungsmöglichkeiten jungen jüdischen Lebens in Deutschland heute.
Jewish Studies and Holocaust Education in Poland
Editor(s): Zimmerman, Lynn W.
Date: 2014
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Holocaust Education, Jewish Studies, Universities / Higher Education, Jewish Education
Abstract: This volume examines how people in Poland learn about Jewish life, culture and history, including the Holocaust. The main text provides background on concepts such as culture, identity and stereotypes, as well as on specific topics such as Holocaust education as curriculum, various educational institutions, and the connection of arts and cultural festivals to identity and culture. It also gives a brief overview of Polish history and Jewish history in Poland, as well as providing insight into how the Holocaust and Jewish life and culture are viewed and taught in present-day Poland.

This background material is supported by essays by Poles who have been active in the changes that have taken place in Poland since 1989. A young Jewish-Polish man gives insight into what it is like to grow up in contemporary Poland, and a Jewish-Polish woman who was musical director and conductor of the Jewish choir, Tslil, gives her view of learning through the arts. Essays by Polish scholars active in Holocaust education and curriculum design give past, present and future perspectives of learning about Jewish history and culture.

Contents:

Introduction

Culture, Identity and Stereotypes

The Historical Context

Jewish Student NGOs in Present-Day Poland (1999–2013): Being Here by Piotr Goldstein

Jewish Studies and Holocaust Education at Polish Universities

The Center for Holocaust Studies at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków: Studies, Research, Remembrance by Jolanta Ambrosewicz-Jacobs, Elisabeth Büttner and Katarzyna Suszkiewicz

Holocaust Education in Polish Public Schools

The Legacy of the Holocaust in Poland and Its Educational Dimension by Piotr Trojański

NGOs and Their Role in Holocaust Education and Jewish Studies

Memory, Non-Memory and Post-Memory of the Holocaust: Coming Out of Amnesia in Post-Communist Poland? by Jolanta Ambrosewicz-Jacobs

Museums: Their Role in Holocaust Education and Jewish Studies

The Role of the Arts in Holocaust Education and Jewish Studies

Teaching About the Holocaust through Music by Izabella Goldstein

Jewish Culture Festivals in Poland

Conclusion
Limmud International - Contributing to the Global Jewish Conversation
Editor(s): Ravid, Shlomi
Date: 2012
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Peoplehood, Limmud, Globalisation
Abstract:

The Limmud mission, which emphasizes learning, diversity and community, has proven to be a compelling set of values. These values are central to international groups. Studies have shown that Limmud participants are highly likely to travel internationally and recognize that they are part of a global community. However, this is not enough. The question that needs to be addressed entails how being a member of an international community can help us strengthen the Jewish people.
Jewish Education and Its Outcomes: Knowledge and Interests among Jewish Summer Camp Participants in the former Soviet Union
Translated Title: החינוך היהודי ותפוקותיו: מה יודעים ובמה מתעניינים משתתפי מחנות הקיץ בברית המועצות לשעבר
Author(s): Epstein, Alek D.
Date: 2013
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Students, Summer/Youth Camps, Israel Education, Surveys
Abstract: The current research is based on two surveys conducted in 2011 and 2012 at nine youth camps organized for high school students’ education and recreation by the Jewish Agency for Israel in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova. Among the campers who responded to our survey, over two-thirds have attended Jewish schools or clubs. However, the study has shown that most respondents had a very limited knowledge of general Jewish and especially Israeli history: only under a quarter (24.7%) came up with three post-biblical names of historical Jewish figures. Recalling three meaningful names in the history of the State of Israel proved to be even more challenging: nearly half of respondents could not recall a single name (47.6%) and only 22.8% stated three relevant names. Respondents also manifested poor familiarity with the history of Russian Jewry over the last two centuries, i.e. their own cultural heritage that apparently is not transferred from parents to children in their (usually ethnically-mixed) families.
Евреи в постсоветских странах: самосознание и образование
Translated Title: Post-Soviet Jewry: Identity and Education
Editor(s): Эпштейн, Алек Д
Date: 2008
Topics: Main Topic: Identity and Community, Jewish Identity, Jewish Education
Reconsidering the Development of Academic Jewish and Israel Studies in Russian
Author(s): Epstein, Alek D.
Editor(s): Khanin, Ze'ev; Epstein, Alek D.; Chernin, Velvl
Date: 2008
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Israel Education, Jewish Studies, Universities / Higher Education
Constructing the National Identity: Jewish Education in Russia Twenty Years after the End of the Cold War
Editor(s): Khanin, Ze'ev; Epstein, Alek D.; Chernin, Velvl
Date: 2008
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Schools
Jewish schools rather than Jewish education? School choice and community dynamics in multicultural society
Translated Title: Des écoles juives plutôt qu’une éducation juive ? Choix d’école et dynamique de communauté dans une société multiculturelle / ¿Escuelas judías en lugar de educación judía? La elección de la escuela y la dinámica de la comunidad en la sociedad multicultural
Author(s): Samson, Maxim G. M.
Date: 2018
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Identity, Jewish Schools, Synagogues, Parenthood, Multiculturalism
Abstract: The expansion of faith schooling in countries such as England raises important questions about their appeal in multicultural societies. Through a case study approach, this article aims to understand the influences behind parents’ decisions to send their children to Jewish schools. It illustrates a tension experienced by Jewish parents between a desire for their children to be educated as a community of ‘similar’ peers, and the segregation that might result as a consequence. In order to ‘justify’ their choice of separate schooling, parents constructed a desirable, essentialized notion of Jewishness that coalesced their two main selection criteria, academic standards and the presence of other Jewish students. By operationalizing their Jewishness for ‘secular’ purposes in such a way, they were able to secure a perceived superior academic education whilst avoiding disfavoured ‘others’ in multicultural comprehensive schools, and in the process defined multiculturalism on their own terms. Consequently, the article foregrounds the broader dynamics of multiculturalism and community that are implicated in questions of (faith) school choice, and the complex intertwinement of parents’ school selection criteria.
Competition or cooperation? Jewish day schools, synagogues and the (re)construction of young people’s Jewish identities in England
Author(s): Samson, Maxim G. M.
Date: 2018
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Identity, Jewish Schools, Synagogues
Abstract: Diasporic synagogues have historically provided a number of educational and social functions. However, the growing popularity of state-funded Jewish schools in England necessitates analysis of these institutions’ changing roles and their implications for performances of Jewishness. Drawing upon interviews with rabbis, and interviews and focus groups with parents and students at a Jewish school, this article demonstrates three challenges for synagogues associated with the recent growth in Jewish day schooling: the instigation of instrumental attendance at services in order to secure a school place; and the co-option of synagogues’ traditional functions as both education and social centres. In the process, it illustrates how conceptualisations of Jewish identity are contested, resulting in discrepant attitudes towards Jewish education. Consequently, the article contributes to understandings of the spaces in which young people practise their Jewishness, and highlights the challenges for community leaders in ensuring that Jewish schools and synagogues cooperate rather than compete.
The Geographies of Jewish Education: Jewish Schools, Synagogues, and the Construction of Young People’s Jewish Identities
Author(s): Samson, Maxim George Morris
Date: 2017
Topics: Main Topic: Education, Jewish Education, Jewish Identity, Jewish Schools, Synagogues, Pluralism, Schools: Seconday / High Schools
Abstract: Faith schools represent controversial aspects of England’s educational politics, yet they have been largely overlooked as sites for geographical analysis. Moreover, although other social science disciplines have attended to a range of questions regarding faith schools, some important issues remain underexamined. In particular, contestation within ethnic and religious groups regarding notions of identity have generally been ignored in an educational context, whilst the majority of research into Jewish schools more specifically has failed to attend to the personal qualities of Jewishness. The interrelationships between faith schools (of all kinds) and places of worship have also received minimal attention. In response, this investigation draws upon a range of theoretical approaches to identity in order to illustrate how Jewish schools are implicated in the changing spatiality and performance of individuals’ Jewishness. Central to this research is a case study of the Jewish Community Secondary School (JCoSS), England’s only pluralist Jewish secondary school, with more extensive elements provided by interviews with other stakeholders in Anglo-Jewry. Parents often viewed Jewish schools as a means of attaining a highly-regarded ‘secular’ academic education in a Jewish school, whilst also enabling their children to socialise with other Jews. In the process, synagogues’ traditional functions of education and socialisation have been co-opted by Jewish schools, revealing a shift in the spatiality of young people’s Anglo-Jewish identity practices. Furthermore, JCoSS, as well as many synagogues, have come to represent spaces of contestation over ‘authentic’ Jewishness, given widely varying conceptualisations of ‘proper’ Jewish practice and identity amongst parents, pupils and rabbis. Yet, although JCoSS offers its pupils considerable autonomy to determine their practices, such choice is not limitless, revealing an inherent dilemma in inclusivity. The thesis thus explores how different manifestations of Jewishness are constructed, practised and problematised in a school space (which itself is dynamic and contested), and beyond.
Fixity and flux: A critique of competing approaches to researching contemporary Jewish identities
Author(s): Samson, Maxim GM; Vanderbeck, Robert M; Wood, Nichola
Date: 2018
Topics: Main Topic: Identity and Community, Jewish Identity, Jewish Education
Abstract: Jewish identities are becoming increasingly pluralised due to internal dynamics within Judaism and wider social processes such as secularisation, globalisation and individualisation. However, empirical research on contemporary Jewish identities often continues to adopt restrictive methodological and conceptual approaches that reify Jewish identity and portray it as a ‘product’ for educational providers and others to pass to younger generations. Moreover, these approaches typically impose identities upon individuals, often as a form of collective affiliation, without addressing their personal significance. In response, this article argues for increased recognition of the multiple and fluid nature of personal identities in order to investigate the diverse ways in which Jews live and perform their Jewishness. Paying greater attention to personal identities facilitates recognition of the intersections between different forms of identity, enabling more complex understandings of the ways in which individuals both define their own identities and contribute to redefining the boundaries of Jewishness.