A second one .. This is insane

Simple1

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 1:46 pm

For starters, parents need to stop branding schools into categories - where some are elite and some are terrible. Then parents wouldn't be so scared to try new schools for their kids if it's a good fit. And then maybe more Gvirim would feel confident in funding these schools.

amother

Gold

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 6:22 pm

Any school can be sustainable if they eliminate the stressful classes (such as math and science) and replace them with home economics classes. Let the school open a bakery and teach the girls to bake babka and challos. Have the students rotate selling the baked goods.

Even better: have the students come up with different marketing ideas for the baked goods and let them compete against each other for the best idea.

amother

Bisque

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 7:29 pm

amother [ Gold ] wrote:

No, eliminating math and science is not a good idea, as these are the areas that jobs are most plentiful in. and especially for a girl who marries a boy in kollel, she will need a high paying job to support her family. Math and science don’t have to be stressful. Even though I’m not great in either subject, I had teachers and professors who made my experiences wonderful. Home economics is important but it should not replace vital math and science classes, especially if we want our children to keep up with the world.

amother

Rose

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 7:38 pm

amother [ Gold ] wrote:

Use proceeds from baked goods sales to pay the limudei Kodesh teachers?

amother

Gold

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 7:54 pm

amother [ Rose ] wrote:

Use proceeds from baked goods sales to pay the limudei Kodesh teachers?

Yes! And put together nice baskets for Simchas! Children as young as 5 can help put together the baskets (wearing gloves).

This one sells for $250 at Oh Nuts:

amother

Black

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 7:58 pm

If talking about a cheaper alternative I say do a program like melamed academy - an online school. Do montesory method, less teachers to pay. Teach the kids skills, so they can get jobs. I know some schools already do some of the things I wrote, but someone has to put together a sustainable plan for all our schools.

amother

Apricot

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 8:06 pm

amother [ Gold ] wrote:

We should do away with schools altogether and lets resort back to 100 years ago where the girls were taught by their mothers at home. The women will be in charge of the home, and the men will be in charge of parnossoh, just like it always was for all of time.

ectomorph

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 8:07 pm

amother [ Gold ] wrote:

Is this sarcastic? What a disastrous idea!! You can't eliminate math!

amother

Rose

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 8:15 pm

time for a paradigm shift?

amother

Violet

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 8:22 pm

By: Yosef Shidler

It was last year Tisha B’Av that my life went, literally, nuts.

It was just a few weeks before the start of the 2018 school year and my daughter, who was five years old at the time, still didn’t have a placement for the upcoming year. I wrote a stormy letter sharing our story which went viral and after being seen by tens of thousands of people, my wife and I got a call from a warm and loving school called Ateres Tziporah, telling us that they would welcome our daughter with open arms.

It should have been smooth sailing from there on in, but it wasn’t. Two weeks later, we found out that the school was having insurmountable financial issues and was closing down. Anyone who knows me knows that I don’t give up easily and, with the permission of Ateres Tziporah’s wonderful menaheles, Mrs. Insel, I launched a crowdfunding campaign. Drawing on my skills as a videographer I put together a beautiful video, showing the world what Ateres Tziporah was all about, a wonderful place that was committed to accepting every girl, something that doesn’t exist anywhere else in Lakewood. The video referenced the now-famous speech given years ago by Shlomo Yehuda Rechnitz, talking about the importance of accepting every child into school, and we were stunned when Reb Rechnitz reached out to us and helped us with an extremely significant donation, something that became known at Ateres Tziporah as “the Rechnitz bailout.”

A school board was appointed and one individual, let’s call him Mr. X., was named to be responsible for Ateres Tziporah’s finances. At the time, all seemed good. My life was finally settling down, other than an anonymous phone call that I had gotten from an older sounding gentleman suggesting that I leave Lakewood and move back to Crown Heights. I actually found it funny and shared a copy of the call with a few friends and it made the rounds on WhatsApp, with numerous people identifying the caller as a well known member of the Lakewood Vaad. A short time later I was called into the office and Mr. X. asked me to sign a document saying that I would not speak out publicly about Ateres Tziporah or the Lakewood Vaad, the implication strongly made that my daughter wouldn’t be showing up in her uniform on the first day of school if I refused. To be honest, I had no problem signing the letter, although the bit about the Vaad was really odd, but my daughter had a school to call her own as did 170 other girls and I had never intended to put myself in the spotlight. There were one or two occasions during the year when I did speak up on behalf of a few parents whose daughters needed schools and most of those girls did end up at Ateres Tziporah – other than that, I kept to my end of the bargain and was happy to just go back to my life, my family and my business.

Baruch Hashem, my daughter blossomed at Ateres Tziporah, an incredible place that truly understands what chinuch habanos is all about. Over the course of the year, my wife and I both kept in touch with Mrs. Insel, volunteering our services countless times for fundraising projects to help the school stay in the black. Mrs. Insel told me that as far as she knew everything was going well and similar offers to Mr. X. also yielded no results. There was one fundraiser that was launched during the year that stalled within a week – other than that we saw no fundraisers at all, but our daughter came home beaming every day and we were thrilled to be Ateres Tzipora parents.

And then about two weeks ago, the rumors started. We heard that the school had been having financial difficulties that absolutely no one knew about and that the staff and Mrs. Insel hadn’t been paid in months. It took time to figure out what was going on and a few days ago I got a text telling me that the school was in serious trouble. I reached out to Mrs. Insel for more information and what happened next is almost too bizarre to believe.

Unbeknownst to anyone, it turns out that by mid-winter, every single member of the board had resigned, claiming that Mr. X. refused to listen to anyone else’s input or consider any opinions other than his own. Mr. X’s was the only signature on the school’s bank accounts, something that was improper and quite possibly illegal, given Ateres Tziporah’s designation as a 501(c)(3). While Mrs. Insel, a dedicated mechaneches with decades of experience had made it clear that she did not want to be involved in the school’s monetary issues, Mr. X. refused to share any information about the school’s finances with anyone, including Mrs. Insel. One individual that Mr. X. had been calling every week without fail to discuss the school’s finances suddenly found that Mr. X. refused to talk to him at winter’s end, failing to return calls, texts or emails. The individual took it as a positive sign that Ateres Tziporah’s finances were under control. Little did he know just how wrong he was….

When word got out two weeks ago that Ateres Tzipora was having financial difficulties, there were generous gvirim with deep pockets who offered to bail out the school on the condition that they be allowed to take a look at the school’s financial records. Mr. X. turned down every offer, refusing to let anyone see the books. I was personally in the school office when Rabbi Insel, Mrs. Insel’s husband said to Mr. X. “Let ‘Mr Z’ take over the operations and we’ll decide where to go from here on the finances and the general situation,” and Mr. X. responded, “It’s my ship; I can decide if it floats or sinks.” Continuing in a similar vein, I asked Mr. X. to name the supposed rabbonim and askanim he claimed to have consulted, a question that was echoed by Mrs. Insel who had been left completely in the dark. His response? “I can’t tell you.”

On Friday, Mr. X. took the unbelievable step of sending out a letter to parents, saying that after months of speaking with professionals, rabanim and askanim, none of whom were named in the letter, the school would be closed down due to financial difficulties. The letter continued by saying that those who were unable to find another placement for their daughter(s) should contact Mr. X. by email only and that he and others will do their best to place them in another school. One would hope that Mr. X. would have been talking about a similar school with comparable standards, but apparently that wasn’t the case.

Are you ready for this one? Mrs. Insel told me herself that last week someone received a phone call from Shalom Torah Academy in Morganville, saying that:

Ateres Tziporah was closing down, which was news to Mrs. Insel
Shalom Torah Academy had been identified as a suitable placement for Ateres Tziporah’s soon to be school-less students
Now don’t get me wrong. Shalom Torah Academy is a wonderful school located approximately 20 miles away that caters to families of all levels of religious observance. They provide boys and girls with a solid education and for many, it is their first real exposure to Torah-true yiddishkeit and their Jewish heritage, an effort that is certainly worthy of praise. But Shalom Torah Academy isn’t a Bais Yaakov school in any way, shape or form and there isn’t a single sane person in this world who thinks that Shalom Torah Academy would be a good fit for an Ateres Tziporah girl. How Mr. X. and the so-called “others” he mentioned in his letter could see this as the right place for our girls is simply beyond comprehension.

The Insels are strongly committed to finding a way to keep Ateres Tziporah running. The Ateres Tziporah parent body, which now represents 170 girls, is very much on board with doing whatever it takes to fundraise and get the school back on its feet. If Mr. X. feels that being financially responsible for Ateres Tziporah is too much for him to handle then someone else will need to be found to take his place. In all honesty, I commend him for standing up last year to take responsibility when no one else did and understand that as a husband, father and business owner, being responsible for the operations and finances of a school is a huge undertaking.

What boggles the mind is this:

Why was no public fundraising done during the school year?
Why did Mr. X. refuse countless requests from Mrs. Insel to hire a full time administrator?
If most of the school’s parents pay full tuition and there were donations coming in, what happened to all that money and why haven’t the staff and Mrs. Insel been paid in months?
If there were problems, why was everyone kept in the dark about it until just now, five weeks before school was set to open?
Why has Mr. X. refused to let anyone else see the Ateres Tziporah’s financial records, even people who were willing to step up and completely cover the school’s deficit? Is something being hidden here?
Why is Mr. X. insisting that the only possibility is to close the school?
How does a single person take it upon himself to unilaterally decide to shut down a school against the will of the principal and parent body and refuse to identify the rabbis who supposedly advised him that this is the correct course of action?
Let me end this letter by saying that this is NOT a fundraising ploy.

Anyone who knows the Insels is well aware that they have nurtured Ateres Tziporah over the past 14 years and have overcome numerous difficult situations, standing by the school because they believe that it plays an important role in the community and in the lives of our daughters. As parents we need to start brainstorming our next step so that we can get things moving in a positive direction. There is no question that Mr. X. has no place in Ateres Tziporah and if we need to re-establish the school under a new name then we will follow that road. Although all of us lead busy lives, we need to step up and put together a board of parents who are committed to the school and its ideals and to put the appropriate administrators in place so that Mrs. Insel can focus on educating our daughters.

The alternatives are unthinkable for us. There is no school in town that has room for all of our daughters and the “cookie-cutter” schools aren’t as accepting as Ateres Tziporah and they won’t take all of our students. We are tentatively calling a meeting for Monday night at 8:30 PM at a location to be determined – please email us at schoolforthegirls613@gmail.com for more details.

Finally, I admit that I am writing this with a heavy heart. Putting out a letter that could hurt another person, is not something I wanted to be doing. It is the three weeks, after all. We are all working on ourselves and trying harder to be the best that we can be. But as we just read in Parshas Pinchas, there are moments in time where we dare not stay silent. There are moments which call for action. I know there are those out there who may not like that this information is being shared and that there are even those who would prefer that Ateres Tziporah didn’t exist because we don’t fit the “typical” Lakewood mold.

But what is happening here cannot be swept under the figurative rug. It isn’t about me. It is about my daughter and 169 girls just like her, all of whom love putting on their uniforms every day and going to school and gaining a greater love and appreciation for Torah and mitzvos.

Isn’t that what our lives are supposed to be all about?

Isn’t that what we are here for?

Current Ateres Tziporah parents who have WhatsApp are asked to join our group so that we can keep everyone informed of the latest developments as quickly as possible. https://chat.whatsapp.com/D9KY.....G4rO7

Moshe Yehuda Gluck
July 28, 2019 at 2:26 pm
As one of the former board members, and speaking for the others, I’d like to set one thing straight about R’ Shidler’s post. I readily agree that things have been mishandled to some greater or lesser degree; intelligent people can disagree as to the amount of that.

But I think it’s important to point out that “Mr. X.” is not a bad guy. He is an honest person who did his best. He deserves credit for that, not to be tarred and feathered and dragged through the town. More than any other single person, he is responsible for the school having been open this year, and it hurts me to see him disparaged like this.

If anyone would like to talk with me about this specific point, please feel free to call me on my cell – 908-910-0387.

Sincerely,
Moshe Yehuda Gluck

amother

Violet

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 8:23 pm

https://greaterlakewood.com/ke.....down/

amother

Lime

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 9:56 pm

Wow, it sounds like a serious financial mismanagement and inside politics that brought this school down.
If Mr X is such a great person, as this former board of directors member is saying, why did each member resigned?
I'm afraid, we'll never know the real reason and there'll be a lot of "he said, she said". Meanwhile, innocent girls' lives are in turmoil now, without an appropriate school.
Just awful Sad

chestnut

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 10:10 pm

amother [ Violet ] wrote:

https://greaterlakewood.com/keep-your-money-id-rather-shut-the-school-down/

PSA - Chestnut commentator there isn't me

amother

Pewter

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 10:18 pm

Violet- seems like a lot of L"H
Alsoooo as someone whose family has been in the middle of AT politics in that past, id say everything should be taken with less than a grain of salt .

nchr

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 10:19 pm

Saying "it's not typical" for Lakewood doesn't sit well with me. It's 200 girls in four grades. That's probably 75 to 100 families at minimum. Are you saying these people aren't a large enough group to demand their own type?

Sebastian

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 10:21 pm

nchr wrote:

170 in 8 grades. That's 15 per class.

Mama Bear

Sun, Jul 28 2019, 11:57 pm

B y the way for the first time in decades, or ever before, a school closed down in Willamsburg. I'm not sure how many girls were in the school total, but I think they had parallel classes for some grades, and they went through 12th grade. I think it started 15 or 16 years ago. and it's not reopening in September. This has never happened before. Hundreds of families are scrambling now. A lot of the bigger schools are firmly saying 'no', they dont hve room for 100s of girls on short notice. it's a big mess.

Mama Bear

Mon, Jul 29 2019, 12:11 am

My autistic son who now lives in a residential school, attended an amazing school for one year, from age 5 to 6. It was a Yiddish speaking school, Yiddish speaking paras, with a Rebbe coming daily to daven with the kids, and top notch academics and therapies. The school was in constant threat of shutting down, and there was tremendous financial mismanagement. This was a school that relied on going to due process with the board of ed and with lawyers, to recoup a staggering $96,000 tuition. The administrator of teh school was a wonderful good-hearted lady who didn't chase after the parents for tuition ahead of time, and relied on the BOE payments to come through. Unfortunately some of the cases were denied, and now they were left with thousands of dollars in the red. But she had such a good heart she couldn't put those students out on the street, so she sufficed with a few thousand dollars tuition from them. In an effort to create teh best learning environment for the special needs students, she hired tons of staff, provided transporation and on-site babysitting for her staff, and other perks. but all this was financially unsustainable, and she called for an S.O.S. meeting of the parents, telling us that the school was on the brink of collapse. one of the school parents is a certified accountant, and he offered, for FREE, on his OWN TIME, to analyze the books and figure out where the financial hole was; the school was billing medicaid for occupational, speech, physical, art, music, aqua, all sorts of therapies,a nd where was all that money going? But nope, she wouldn't open her books to anyone, just insisting that the parents have to fundraise and the parents have to save the school. By the end of the year all of us panicked that the school would shut down at some point (the paras went on strike, all kinds of craziness), and half of us, the ones with viable reimbusement cases, pulled our kids from the school and established a new Bi-Yi (yiddish speaking class in a public school). Within a year her school shut down.
I can't tell you how terrible I felt for this wonderful lady and her school that was a warm Yiddishe environment for our precious special children. All because she just wouldn't be honest & transparent and let professionals analyze her accounting.
It's sad how people drive thriving mosdos into the ground without considering the broader implications.

giselle

Mon, Jul 29 2019, 8:03 am

nchr wrote:

Your calculation is incorrect, as noted above, but I agree with you about the “not typical” comment. There is at least one other school that’s not typical Lakewood either, and they are flourishing.

Simple1

Mon, Jul 29 2019, 8:18 am

giselle wrote:

Hope I wasn't misunderstood regarding "typical". Firstly, these schools are run like regular Lakewood schools, but with more diversity in the parent body and slight variation in the rules that are enforced. Secondly, I agree that these schools are very needed. And other such schools do succeed. But it's also true that the more right-wing schools have a much higher likelihood of succeeding because more people are choosing those schools - whether or not this is the right choice for them.

I was really actually just trying to say that the Kollel bashing has no place in this thread and no correlation to the school closings.