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88. Friday, September 24, 1976
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Assimilation Blamed for Declining Jewish Enrollment
By ALAN HITSKY
"Jewish parents are not enrolling-Jewish kids 1.1
Jewish schools," is the blunt way Dr. Jay B. Stern,
superintendent of Detroit's United Hebrew Schools,
explains the declining enrollment ofJewish schools in
Detroit and throughout the United States. .
Brushing aside the declining national birth rate
which is affecting U.S. public schools, Dr. Stern points
to a long-term trend in Jewish education. "Birth rate
is a part of it," Dr. Stern explained in a recent inter-
view, "but Jewish parents are either not enrolling
their Jewish children or they are enrolling them for
shorter periods of time. In a word . . . assimilation!"
He cited statistics from the American Jewish
Yearbook and a year-old study by Harold S. Himmel-
farb of Ohio State University that show that there has
been a one-third drop in Jewish school enrollment dur-
ing the last 15 years. Himmelfarb is co-editor of the
American Jewish Committee's Commentary
Magazine.
Nationwide, the most seriously affected are the af-
ternoon schools. Dr. Stern said the trend among Jewish
parents seems to be toward either more Jewish educa-
tion, via the day schools, or less education through en-
rollment in Sunday schools.
"There is probably less dissatisfaction on the part
of the Sunday school parent than the afternoon school
„parent because they expect less and get less," Dr.
Stern said.
He said the afternoon schools, such as United He-
brew School, provide 200 hours per year of instruction
for an average of five yearslorior to Bar Mitzva. Those
1,000 hours are the equivalent of one year of public
Jewish School Enrollment
Detroit 1975-76
UNITED HEBREW- SCHOOLS
Adat Shalom_
Beth Achim
Bnai David
Bnai Moshe and Temple Emanu431
UHS High School
Shaarey Zedek High School
1,807
257
395,
264
418
229
244
INDEPENDENT and SECULAR
4,334
Beth Abraham-Hillel
213
Adat Shalom nursery
12.6
Beth Shalom primary and elementary 274
Shaarey Zedek nursery and elementary 897
Temple Beth El
Temple Israel
Temple Emanu-El
Temple Kol Ami
924
1,270
:301
345
DAY SCHOOLS
Akiva
Beth Yehudah-Beth Jacob
Hillel
Cheder
1,025
235
408
352
. 30
TOTAL
7,466
school, and according to Himmelfarb, "at least 3,000
hours of religious instruction are needed before
Jewish schooling has any lasting impact."
Dr. Stern suggests that Jewish students should
Jewish Enrollment
continue their Jewish studies at least through high
U.S. --- 1960-1975
school so that they will at least begin to approach the
3,000-hour minimum.
Age 4-17
Himmelfarb also states:
1960
600,000
• Supplementary types ofJewish education (Sunday
1970
460,000
schools and weekday afternoon schools) generally do not
1976
400,000*
increase adult religious involvement beyond the level
* = estimated
obtained by those with no Jewish schooling unless one
has more than 12 years of such schooling.
• Even all-day Jewish schools generally do not
increase adult religious involvement beyond the level
obtained by those with no Jewish schooling unless one
has more than six years of such schooling. At that level
Dr. JAY B. STERN
all-day schools are effective in producing a higher de- number of students in post-Bar Mitzva high school
gree of four types of religious involvement: 1) ritual and that the financial problem, although always a
observance; 2) interest in Jewish books, art and music; .problem, is not insurmountable.
3) charitable behavior and attitudes; and 4) a sense of
Dr. Stern said synagogue schools are having the
personal obligation to immigrate to Israel.
•toughest time meeting rising costs (up an average of
• There are no differences in adult religious in- 10 percent each year). "Their declining memberships
volvement between those who had more than 12 years can't support these costs. When I first got started (in
of supplementary Jewish schooling and those who had Jewish education) there were 80-90 large synagogue
more than 12 years of all-day Jewish schooling.
schools in the country with 800-1,000 students," he
Himmelfarb says the last point shows "that said. "Now there are less than 10."
supplementary schools can be effective if students at-
He added that of the $200 million annually spent in
tend for long enough" but "very few Jewish students the U.S.
on Jewish education only $13-14 million is
get that much religious schooling.
provided by local Jewish federations. He said that fed-
"Thus in terms of long range consequences for erations would not be able to fund their other
Jewish identity, these data indicate that the type of priorities if they tried to totally fund Jewish educa-
Jewish education received by 80 percent of those Ameri-
tion.
can Jews who have received any Jewish education has
In terms of the role of the Jewish school, Dr. Stern
-been a waste of time."
sees changes that mirror the situation of the public
But Dr. Stern points to some positive signs. The schools. "Kids are spending less and less time in schools,
number of college programs in Judaic studies has risen yet schools are being asked to deliver more. In Jewish
from just a few in 1960 to more than 600 in 1976. Most
of the programs are in English, and more than 300 schools," he said, "the average used to be 10-12 hours
per week-on Hebrew and prayer books. Now the average
colleges offer degrees in Judaic studies.
is six to seven hours on a wide variety of topics. The
A few of the graduates of these American college tendency is to cover a lot of ground superficially, and the
programs are beginning to filter into the Jewish basic problem is too much in too little time."
schools as teachers. The trend before 1948 was that the
Although 90 percent of all Jewish children get
main source ofJewish teachers in the U.S. were Euro-
pean trained.
some formal Jewish education in their life --times, the
After the establishment of the state of Israel 600,000 students in the U.S. aged 4-17 enrolled in
many Israelis were hired in American Jewish schools. Jewish schools in 1960 represented only one-third of
"Midrasha was founded here in 1948 to develop the potential Jewish school population. In Detroit this
teachers," Dr. Stern added, bill few of the students fall, roughly 7,000 Jewish students will attend Jewish
schools, if only once per week, out of a potential Jewish
wanted to teach the lower grades because of the part-
time nature of the job. The bulk of the teachers in student population estimated at 15,000.
afternoon schools now are women, he said, because of
To make Jewish schools more effective Dr. Stern
the part-time factor.
suggests more realistic expectations. "We have to
He said personnel will continue to be a problem. have
a more limited view of what schools can do. The
"The teachers won't be American-born, America-- people who want the schools to make their children
trained for a long time to come." But, he said an -excep- committed Jews in spite of the home environment, or
tion was the substantial number of day high school ask the schools to prevent intermarriage, in this sense
graduates who want to go into Jewish education.
the schools are a failure.
Other positive signs in Jewish education cited by
"Jewish schools should be converted to skill-
Dr. Stern are the growth of camps with Jewish prog- schools," he said, "but it would be tough to get a con-
ramming, the improvements in Jewish curricula, the sensus of which skills should be emphasized."
Hebrew Scholarship Perpetuated at Oxford University
BY MAURICE SAMUELSON
(Copyright 1976, JTA, Inc.)
like "an isolated maniac"
here. Though Oxford's
theology department
taught classical Hebrew,
it had little to do with the
language of the - modern
Jewish renaissance.
OXFORD — In the
Middle Ages, one of
Europe's principal
Jewish communities was
_ in Oxford, where its rab-
But things changed
bis and sages helped
churchmen in their study over the past two decades
of Hebrew and the Old as a growing number of
Testament. Seven cen- Jewish scholars came to
turies after the Jews were Oxford University. Many
expelled from England, were drawn by its lib-
and three centuries after raries; some to study
Cromwell readmitted modern Hebrew under
them, the flames of Patterson, whose appli-
Jewish scholarship are cation of modern literary
burning brightly in this criticism to Hebrew had,
famous city. For the first as one leading scholar has
time, though, it burns in a testified, "virtually
specifically Jewish set- created a new branch of
ting, the oxford Center Hebrew scholarship."
for Post-Graduate He- After prolonged negotia-
tions, the university fi-
brew Studies.
Modelled on the Prince- nally agreed to give its
ton post-graduate center recognition to a center for
in the U.S., it is the post-graduate Hebrew
brain-child of Dr. David studies. Patterson, who
Patterson, who arrived in had conceived it, became
Oxford nearly 20 years its first principal.
ago to become a lecturer
The center began hum-
in post-biblical Hebrew. bly in 1972 in one room in
For many years, the the Oriental Institute
quiet-spoken scholar felt where Patterson had
taught since 1957. Since
then, as a result of private
financing from Britain and
abroad, it has acquired its
own building which gives
it the dignity and aspect, if
not the full status, of an
Oxford college. In the
middle of town, lectures,
research and seminars
take place in a fine Geor-
gian house.
Here, T. Carmi, the
poet, is putting the finish-
ing touches to the Pen-
guin Book of Modern He-
brew Verse, on which he
has worked for 10 years.
N.S. Doniach is supervis-
ing the compilation of an
English-Hebrew dictio-
nary of current usage, a
five-year task due to be
completed in 1979. Stu-
dents of varying
standards study Yiddish
and Hebrew in the lan-
guage laboratories.
But the center's main
home is at Yarnton
Manor, an imposing
Jacobean property set in
8 1/2 acres of land five
miles north of Oxford.
Here, amid rural quiet,
some of the world's lead-
ing Judaic scholars, to-
gether with younger stu-
dents, engage in writing
and research. Some are
accommodated in the
honey-colored stone
manor, while others live
with their families in the
six cottages dotted
around the grounds.
Although opened less
than three years ago, the
place already exudes an
atmosphere of friendli-
ness and learning. Espe-
cially popular are the
after-dinner talks by
visiting Fellows on their
fields of research, which
attract audiences from
many parts of Oxford.
Of the 50 distinguished
scholars enrolled on
Yarnton Manor's
academic staff, most are
from Israel, the United
States and Britain. Prof.
Ezra Spicehandler, dean
of Hebrew Union College,
Jerusalem, is spending his
third summer here, com-
pleting a book on Bialik.
Also here this year
were Dr. Wolf Kelman, of
the Jewish Theological
Seminary of America,
New York, and Prof. -S.
Werses, of the Hebrew
University.
Israel's leading Yiddish
scholars also come to con-
sult the Bodleian Lib-
rary's collection of publi-
cations printed between
the 16th and 19th Cen-
turies which has no rival
anywhere in the world.
Meanwhile, the basis of
Yarnton Manor's own li-
brary has been laid. The
center has acquired the
life-time collection of the
leading bibliographer of
modern Hebrew litera-
ture. Since arriving in Is-
rael from Galicia 46 years
ago, Getzel Kressel has
built up a specialized li-
brary of up to 30,000 vol-
umes and pamphlets
dealing with Hebrew
writing and the growth of
the yishuv. He has also
amassed a newspaper
archive containing be-
tween a million and two
million clippings.
When the news broke in
Israel two years ago that
he was letting the collec-
tion leave the country,
there was an outcry in the
press. But Kressel, a
small, white-haired man of
65, says that he sold it to
Oxford only after nine
years of negotiations with
Israeli universities. They
apparently balked at his
insistence that the collee
tion should_not be broke
up. Patterson gave him
this pledge.
N Ow, Kressel and his
wife are unpacking the
last of the 186 boxes in
which the collection ar-
rived two years ago.
Among the rarities he
sh-owed me with pride
were bound volumes of
the first Hebrew news-
paper in
paper
Jerusalem 105. years ago,
"Havatselet," and the full
run of Theodor Herzl's
Zionist newspaper, "Die
Welt."
Despite his • initial de-
sire to keep the collection
in Israel, he was now very
happy about its new
home.