Home
Log in / Sign Up
    Private Messages   Advanced Search   Rules   New User Guide   FAQ   Advertise   Contact Us  
Forum -> Parenting our children -> School age children
How problematic is a "community day school"?
1  2  Next



Post new topic   Reply to topic View latest: 24h 48h 72h

amother
OP


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 7:24 am
We've got a newborn and we're seriously thinking of buying a house in a very OOT community that's fairly near my parents (who aren't frum) so we can have help with this kid and future kids. the shul just built and eruv and now has an orthodox daily minyan and is growing, so there's potential that this could be a place where we could make a long term home.

what's keeping the shul from growing faster is the school situation. some of the truly frum people are in this community because they need to be there for work, and will leave as soon as they can because of the school situation. we're worried about the school situation for when our kid(s) become that age, but we're hoping that we could make this a long term home.

the school situation is a "community day school." they've apparently developed an "orthodox track" in the last few years, but it's unclear how effective such a thing is -- both in terms of the quality of the jewish education and still being exposed to a ton of non-frum kids. we're MO and don't necessarily think we'd send our kids to the most right wing school, but this school would expose our kid to plenty of kids who aren't even jewish, are from intermarried homes, non-frum teachers, etc. is this kind of environment necessarily bad? could we make it work?
Back to top

amother
Magenta


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 7:46 am
It's complicated.

There is the exposure, which is not nothing. And there's the possible reduction of standards and lack of autonomy to make decisions. For example, in the Orthodox track, are they teaching that you are Jewish if your mother is Jewish or if you converted, or are they teaching that the Orthodox say this and this group says that you're also Jewish if your father is, and this group says you're Jewish if that's how you identify, and all are right? In essence, what is the role of basic halachah and derech?

And if the kids are giving the correct message in classes, does the overall school environment as well as assemble, materials home, etc, overrule that? Does the Orthodox track have the authority to control who is admitted to their track and under what conditions, as well as their curriculum, without any veto power or requirements from the overall school? So there are a lot of questions to ask.
Back to top

FranticFrummie




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 7:55 am
I can only tell you from personal experience. I'm RWMO, and I put DD in a mixed Jewish school. It was the worst thing I could have done.

She is a very black and white thinker. She saw what we do at home, and in our shul, and she saw what the other kids were doing, and she thought "If they are Jewish, and they are doing it, why can't I do it too?" This put me in a difficult situation, do I say that the non frum kids are "doing it wrong?" Then she'd go back to school and start arguments with everyone.

I couldn't send her to friend's houses on Shabbos, because the kids all either openly had electronics, or knew how to sneak them into their rooms. The kids swore, the parent's homes had questionable kashrus, their middos were not great. If the kids' parents were big donors to the school, she was often on the receiving end of bullying and nothing would be done.

Eventually she ended up in public school because she needed some special tutoring and therapy. One day she came home and asked me "Mama, why are all the non Jewish kids so much nicer than the Jewish ones? They have such nice middos!" How do you answer that?

When a child is confused, and they have to choose between the frum option, or the fun and permissive one, guess which one the child will choose.

She's 17 now, and not the least bit religious. Sad
Back to top

amother
Papaya


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 8:27 am
We have a pluralistic Jewish day school in our community which has talked for years about trying to develop an Orthodox track and even added at one time some separate davening and learning for Orthodox students. They mean well, but their offerings have never even come close to being a true track. That is not entirely the school's fault in my opinion, because they simply never had enough Orthodox kids to make a full-fledged track viable. If they had 7-10 Orthodox kids per grade instead of 1-4, maybe there would have been more impetus and more resources. As it is, only a few MO families in our community choose to send there over the Orthodox schools available, usually because the latter are too right wing for them. The rest of the MO families send to the more right wing Orthodox schools.

If you are still considering other communities, you should know that the term "community day school" means different things in different communities. In many places, a community day school is an Orthodox-run and Orthodox-staffed (for Judaics at least) school that is called "community" because it accepts all halachically Jewish children who are willing to follow school rules inside the school building, without fussing over the parents' and childrens' level of observance outside of school. So a community day school is not necessarily non-Orthodox, as in your target community.
Back to top

Hashem_Yaazor




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 8:41 am
What Papaya said.

However if there are no Orthodox only options available, it's possible the Orthodox ratio is higher if that's the only local option.

Could you go visit and check out the school?
Back to top

amother
OP


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 8:47 am
Thanks for all the responses so far. What's very helpful is all the questions to ask and the issues to think about -- even more of that would be great! With a better idea of what kinds of things to ask, I can ask better questions to the frum parents I know.
Back to top

Raisin




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 8:57 am
My kids go to a school a bit like this. We supplement at home Judaic studies, and also send them away for middle or High school. At that age they really need frum peers...so it really depends if your community is growing or not, but bear in mind you may need to do that. Even if there is a frum high school, it may not work for your kid. Another thing to bear in mind is that your children probably won't want to stick around once they are shidduch age, and possibly once they get married. I know that is a LONG time in the future for you but it will happen.
Back to top

amother
Papaya


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 8:58 am
Questions

1. How many Orthodox students in the school total? How does it vary in each grade? If there are two classes per grade, will all the Orthodox students be placed in the same class?

2. Describe the Judaics content and curriculum. Who teaches Judaics? What are the texts or materials, if any? Is the school Zionist (if this matters to you)?

3. What are the kashrus rules for the school cafeteria? In-school celebrations? Birthday treats handed out in class?

4. Is there davening? What is it like? Is it mandatory? Can a student daven alone if they prefer?

5. Are the Orthodox students taught separately for any portion of the day? For how long and what portion?

6. At what age do students begin to depart for non-Jewish schools, public or private? How many kids total are in the 8th grade? In the 7th? 6th? 5th?

7. (To current Orthodox parents): do you supplement? How and what subjects? Do you feel it's effective?

I presume everything will be co-ed, but you can always ask to confirm.
Back to top

amother
Royalblue


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 9:04 am
I just want to mention that when you move to a new community that is still evolving in character, you moght find that things are very different in 5 or 10 years.
In my community, when I first moved here the MO school was pretty solid. Today, just 15 years later, most of the student body is not frum. Someone I know who graduated from there said she is only one of 5 kids in her whole grade who is shomer shabbos. Many of the parents are much frummer, but the kids are not. Also, the administratuon has changed over so much over the years.


When I first moved here, there was a solid yeshiva high school. By the time we had boys in high school, it was not so solid anymore, and most yeshivish boys go oot for yeshiva.

I think that when you move to a new community based on the school situation, you need to be open to the fact that often these things are fluid.

Someone once told me good advice when making big decisions: think in terms of 5 years. Can you see yourself living there for the next 5 years? You only have one kid now. In 5 years, your circumstances could be totally different. You can reevaulate then.
When you think you need to make a decision of where you will settle for the next 20 years, it could be very hard and almost crippling.
Back to top

amother
Forestgreen


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 9:17 am
My husband called an old friend the other day. We live in a very small community and our kids go to a small MO school which has the full range of observancy from not really frum at all to right wing MO to chabad. The friend lives in NY and is black hat and lives in a large community. Amazing, loving, down to earth families on both sides, imo Wink

They have a kid off the derech and yet all our kids, so far BH, are solid in their observance. Even the one who actually went to a non jewish school for years for various reasons.

So how can this be? Hashem. And luck. Honestly, I think it's beautiful to see that the frum world has all different types of Torah loving Jews and that there is a place for everyone. I don't want my kids to be so curious about what else is out there that they have to experiment or rebel to find it, if that makes sense. Right now, they see it around them and they accept it. They are friends with everyone because we are friends with everyone. I have a lot of kids from age 6 to teens, fwiw.
Back to top

Crookshanks




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 9:51 am
amother [ Papaya ] wrote:
If you are still considering other communities, you should know that the term "community day school" means different things in different communities. In many places, a community day school is an Orthodox-run and Orthodox-staffed (for Judaics at least) school that is called "community" because it accepts all halachically Jewish children who are willing to follow school rules inside the school building, without fussing over the parents' and childrens' level of observance outside of school. So a community day school is not necessarily non-Orthodox, as in your target community.

This. The day schools that I know of are run by frum Jews and operate according to halacha, though with a looser dress code and some non religious students. However, the hanhala and Kodesh staff are all frum, which obviously makes a tremendous difference.
Back to top

ora_43




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 11:24 am
One big issue for me would be, how many frum kids will there be for your kid(s) to potentially be friends with? Like, if there's an 'orthodox track' with 5-6 kids, that's a teeny-tiny social circle. That's not always the worst thing, but it can be really really bad if your kid doesn't click with any of the other kids.

Another question - what's the turnover like? Like, there's a big difference between a small frum community of 30 families, and a small frum community that has 30 families today and will have 30 families in 10 years, but only 10 of those will be members of the original 30. Much harder to make friends if people are constantly moving away.

If there aren't frum options for middle school or high school, that's something that's likely to cause high turnover.

All that said - your kid is a newborn. IMHO, you should go ahead and move now to a community that's good for you now. If in 5-6 years you see that the community is fairly stable, and growing, and that the school seems decent - great! If not, then you can consider moving.
Back to top

Frumme




 
 
    
 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 11:41 am
amother [ Papaya ] wrote:

If you are still considering other communities, you should know that the term "community day school" means different things in different communities. In many places, a community day school is an Orthodox-run and Orthodox-staffed (for Judaics at least) school that is called "community" because it accepts all halachically Jewish children who are willing to follow school rules inside the school building, without fussing over the parents' and childrens' level of observance outside of school. So a community day school is not necessarily non-Orthodox, as in your target community.


I agree, I once interviewed to work at a Jewish community school that was run by unobservant Jews. It was an interesting experience! They actually accepted a lot of non Jewish students to their school. There wasn't much religion at all in the school, and the Orthodox track was basically 4-5 kids who had elective Gemara or Jewish history. Otherwise the most Jewish thing that the students learned was how to design and decorate your own tallis (not denegrating that-- it was beautiful-- but that was basically all of their Jewish education).

So yeah. There are community schools and then there are community schools.
Back to top

amother
Ruby


 

Post Wed, Mar 31 2021, 9:36 pm
as someone who was the most right wing kid in my class in a MO community school so at least most people shomer shabbos and kashrus. . no no no. I wouldn't do it to my kids. It's so frustrating following different rules then your friends.
Back to top

amother
Coral


 

Post Thu, Apr 01 2021, 12:18 am
As someone said there are community schools and community schools

Were I grew up the Boys and girls were in two separate buildings a few miles apart-When they started to build the girls school the plan was to put the boys school on the same property my mother still talks about the fight. The school was a mix of MO and Yeshiva kids, depending on the grade some years there were more MO kids some years there were more yeshiva kids. There might have been some non-frum kids there also, most if not almost all came from frum back rounds. The boys school had a track for the yeshiva kids whose parents wanted them to go to yeshiva high schools. Everyone went there because it was the only school we all got along.

My DH went to a community school the parent body was MO or not frum the boys and girls were together in the same class room. They did teach Chumush, Gemorha, ect.

When I think of a community I think of what I went to My DH thinks of were he went to.
Back to top

amother
OP


 

Post Thu, Apr 01 2021, 3:55 pm
So, I got some more info. As we aren't at the school age kid stage and we grew up going to public schools, we have no idea what to make of the info.

In case it wasn't clear, this is NOT an orthodox-run school.

The normal school track has 1.5 hours a day of Jewish stuff, including 45 minutes of Hebrew and 45 minutes of religious stuff. For the orthodox track, the kids get pulled out of all of that and have 1.5 hours of orthodox religious stuff. The ortho track kids miss out on the Hebrew, although they try to incorporate some Hebrew grammar into the religious stuff.

In the ortho track, all the material is taught by serious frum people. Seems like one of the local orthodox rabbis, his wife, and his mother are all among the teachers.

There's about 25 kids in the whole ortho track from 1st to 8th grade, though it's not necessarily evenly distributed. Some of the grades are combined, like 2nd/3rd. It seems like the various frum teachers teach different groups of frum kids.

The orthodox track is maybe 20% of the school. But the frum people are optimistic that will grow.

The frum people say the school admin is very supportive of the frum community and realizes they need them for the school to continue to grow. (Cynically, I guess they need the bodies and tuition and realize they're better off getting on board?) The frum people say the school takes kashrut seriously and there are strict rules about kids bringing stuff from home.

Is 1.5 hours a day of Jewish studies typical in a frum school? In a right-wing frum school? In a more MO frum school? On one hand, if it's really small classes, I feel like kids could get a ton out of that and that's a good thing. On the other hand, that doesn't seem like much.

I get the sense that the kids may be end up behind if they're headed for a serious yeshiva HS. We're not sure if we'd want kids to go to a more MO HS or a more yeshiva HS, but I'd wonder if the kids would be behind even going to a more MO HS.

I hope that helps paint a better picture. What do you make of all this?

(Also, this info is just a snapshot of what the school is like now. If the community grows, maybe things are better. If it doesn't, maybe it'll just be the same in 5 years.)
Back to top

finprof




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, Apr 01 2021, 4:23 pm
We also live OOT and a community school is the only option. Its great that an Orthodox track is offered at all, we don't have that! The 1.5 hours does sound "light" but when I looked at my kid's schedule its pretty much the same on Judaics and Hebrew. I know that my first grader has Judaics and Hebrew from 12-3:30 daily (its the same teacher for that grade so I'm not sure of the breakdown). My 3rd grader has davening and Judaics from 8-9 and Hebrew from 12-1 daily plus 2 "workshops" per week (Hebrew with the local shaliach, Hagada prep ect).

Most kids go to a pluralistic or public school for HS. There is an MO option about 2 hours away. The kids who have gone there tend to leave our school after 5th grade so that they won't be to far behind. DH wants our kids to do this but 4 hours of daily commuting for a 10 yr old is crazy IMHO.
Back to top

amother
Lilac


 

Post Thu, Apr 01 2021, 4:30 pm
To be honest, there are reasons I pay the ridiculous cost/expenses of living in Teaneck. I would have much more money if I lived elsewhere but that wouldn’t improve my quality of life. This is my quality of life.

I have friends who grew up out of town. Who lived out of town, friends who went away for night school, and friends whose parents moved in town when OOT wasn’t working for their family (kids).

People do move. Would you be open to moving in 5-7 year or do you want to put down permanent roots either there or somewhere else right now?

Personally, I would prioritize my children, not my friends/comfort level/house size/job seniority......
Consider moving there, but think of it as short term with the option to move as soon as it is not working.

FYI, something to think about from the poster above who stated that she is OOT and her friend is in town and has an OTD child, sometimes when you are not part of a large group, it gives you more personalized attention and makes you more independent, and responsible. My friend’s son goes to college with 11 frum guys. Everyone shows up for minyan every morning and volunteers to lain/be Shaliach Tzibor... because everyone depends on them, on a campus with 100 frum guys, it is easier to sleep in and be invisible (or just disappear).
There is no right or wrong answer. I would just advise that if you move there, to be fluid.
Back to top

Rappel




 
 
    
 

Post Thu, Apr 01 2021, 4:33 pm
A growing community is what you make of it.

Could you see yourself starting a school for frum kids?
Back to top

amother
Yellow


 

Post Thu, Apr 01 2021, 5:13 pm
amother [ OP ] wrote:
So, I got some more info. As we aren't at the school age kid stage and we grew up going to public schools, we have no idea what to make of the info.

In case it wasn't clear, this is NOT an orthodox-run school.

The normal school track has 1.5 hours a day of Jewish stuff, including 45 minutes of Hebrew and 45 minutes of religious stuff. For the orthodox track, the kids get pulled out of all of that and have 1.5 hours of orthodox religious stuff. The ortho track kids miss out on the Hebrew, although they try to incorporate some Hebrew grammar into the religious stuff.

In the ortho track, all the material is taught by serious frum people. Seems like one of the local orthodox rabbis, his wife, and his mother are all among the teachers.

There's about 25 kids in the whole ortho track from 1st to 8th grade, though it's not necessarily evenly distributed. Some of the grades are combined, like 2nd/3rd. It seems like the various frum teachers teach different groups of frum kids.

The orthodox track is maybe 20% of the school. But the frum people are optimistic that will grow.

The frum people say the school admin is very supportive of the frum community and realizes they need them for the school to continue to grow. (Cynically, I guess they need the bodies and tuition and realize they're better off getting on board?) The frum people say the school takes kashrut seriously and there are strict rules about kids bringing stuff from home.

Is 1.5 hours a day of Jewish studies typical in a frum school? In a right-wing frum school? In a more MO frum school? On one hand, if it's really small classes, I feel like kids could get a ton out of that and that's a good thing. On the other hand, that doesn't seem like much.

I get the sense that the kids may be end up behind if they're headed for a serious yeshiva HS. We're not sure if we'd want kids to go to a more MO HS or a more yeshiva HS, but I'd wonder if the kids would be behind even going to a more MO HS.

I hope that helps paint a better picture. What do you make of all this?

(Also, this info is just a snapshot of what the school is like now. If the community grows, maybe things are better. If it doesn't, maybe it'll just be the same in 5 years.)


Ok, this is not what many ppl describe as a community school.
For example, I live in Cleveland, and Hebrew academy is considered a community school. Look it up online and see what it looks like. Laugh

I'll give you my ideas and things to consider.

personally, I would not send my kids to a non orthodox run school. The school's vision and hashkafa is going to be so so off.

25 frum kids in 8 grades means an average of 1.5 boys and 1.5 girls per grade. That is an incredibly small pool of friends.
1.5 kids to be friends with your age. What if your kids don't like their one and only grade mate who it's frum?
Will your kids be going over to the nonfrum kids' homes on Sundays and for birthday parties? How do you see that working?

My elementary school daughter has 3 hour and 45 minutes of Limudei Kodesh (Jewish studies) daily. That includes 20 min recess and 20 min lunch, and probably around 45 min of Davening. So down to about 2+ hours of actual instruction, chumash, halacha, yahadus, dikduk, etc.

BUT she is surrounded by 20 frum girls who are coming from frum homes, so similar hashkafa, with a morah who is a role model for all those hours.
I feel that there is so much peer influence from recess discussions, etc.

My sons have much more kodesh time. 9-2 (5 hours) that includes LOTS of recess, and lunch. But I'd imagine that without including Davening (also, 20 min to an hr depending on the grade), the kids are learning for 3 hours of instructional time.

I'm assuming your1.5 hours mentioned above include davening? The kids will be learnin VERY little.
Back to top
Page 1 of 2 1  2  Next Recent Topics




Post new topic   Reply to topic    Forum -> Parenting our children -> School age children

Related Topics Replies Last Post
How to avoid vaccinating my baby until school
by amother
215 Today at 8:01 am View last post
What knapsacks are "in" for upcoming 9th grade?
by amother
6 Yesterday at 11:00 pm View last post
Some kids don’t thrive in a school setting 33 Yesterday at 10:54 pm View last post
S/o Top BY school for girl with HFASD
by amother
20 Yesterday at 6:38 pm View last post
Did anyone get accepted to girl’s high school?
by amother
9 Yesterday at 5:15 pm View last post