Meanwhile, in New York City, they are going ahead with plans to implement an all-Arabic school and curriculum. And, the curriculum is still a mystery. Hmm, I wonder why.
Thanks to Michael:
A charter school has been ordered to temporarily suspend Hebrew classes while officials try to determine whether teachers are advocating the Jewish faith.
Broward Schools Superintendent James Notter sent a letter to officials at the Ben Gamla Charter School in Hollywood on Wednesday advising them to halt Hebrew classes until the school board could further examine the curriculum.
"If it comes up in the course of conversation, that is one thing but if it comes to promoting religion or proselytizing, we don't want it to happen," said Keith Bromery, a spokesman for the Broward schools.
Ben Gamla is in its first week of operation as the country's first Hebrew-language charter school, but school founder Peter Deutsch, a former Democratic congressman, said he told teachers Thursday to halt the classes. He said he shared Notter's aim to ensure religion doesn't enter a publicly funded school.
"His goal and my goal are really exactly the same," Deutsch said.
The ban on Hebrew will extend at least until Sept. 11, when the board next meets. Until then, time that would have been spent on language instruction will be used teaching Israeli geography and Jewish history and culture.
Deutsch said he believes the school has every right to continue Hebrew classes, but decided to stop them to ease concerns. Both he and school board member Eleanor Sobel, in whose district Ben Gamla is located, have described their efforts as "bending over backwards" for one another.
Ben Gamla presented its curriculum to the board for a third time Tuesday, but Sobel said it still had religious overtones.
"We're going into the fourth round now and maybe that's what it takes to get it right," she said.
Ben Gamla, which has about 400 students in kindergarten through eighth grades, has generated controversy since it was proposed. Students follow state curriculum, but also were to take a Hebrew language course, and one of their core subjects - math or physical education, for example - was to be taught bilingually as well.
School officials ran into tough opposition at Broward County School Board meetings when proposing Hebrew textbooks that included passages criticized as being too religious. Even the Anti-Defamation League and the Jewish Federation of Broward County have expressed church-state separation issues.
Ben Gamla hopes to expand further in South Florida and to open schools in New York and Los Angeles. It takes its name from a Jewish high priest, serves kosher food, and its director is a rabbi. Without Hebrew classes, though, Deutsch said its most central component is missing.
"It is kind of crazy - the only Hebrew-English charter school in America doesn't teach Hebrew," he said.
Sounds like Mr. Ben Gamla has a good attitutde about cooperating with U.S. laws.
Unlike some other people.
4 comments:
I wish Mr. Ben Gamla much success with future expansions.
However, if this endeavor is challenged legally, it would be a clever way to rid this country of publicly funded 'magnet' school/madrassas - permanently.
In the US, Jews have managed with private yeshivas and after school hebrew lessons/tutors for generations at our own personal expense. This Hebrew magnet school concept would definitely prove successful - but it's not worth having at the expense of allowing publicly funded madrassas. Some sacrifices are easy to make.
{add to dictionary}
Proselytizing jews
{/add to dictionary}
COMPILE
That's actually FUNNY.
I have to go now, jews promoting the faith are ringing the doorbell
Epa,
I was actually going to add to this post, a video (but, I couldn't find it on YouTube, and it disappeared from Yahoo) I saw on CNN about the guy who started Dominoes Pizza, and how he is building a "Catholic city" in South Florida.
Both situations deal with Church/State issues.
In my opinion, both the Dominoes guy, and Mr. Ben Gamla are handling the situations correctly. In other words, they are both attempting to build communities within which their faiths can be sustained, and yet at the same time, they are clearly subservient to, and willing to learn from, the law and Constitution of the United States.
In the video about the Catholic City (called Ave Maria), there is a family who moved into the city who are named Eisaman. I assume they are Jewish. (Their reason for moving into the town was because they wanted to rasie their children is a safe environment).
The point is, the Dominoes guy realized that it is not Constitutional to start an all-Catholic town, and he submitted to the law. Mr. Ben Gamla is learning the limits of what he can and can not do with a public school, and he is more than willing to submit to the law.
Muslims don't, generally, display this same willingness, do they?
OT EPA, I notice the image included with your comment is one I recall being used by a commenter on another blog (AOW) by a poster using the nic Ducky (or some such). Your style and his are diametric opposed. Is this image someone famous? Kindly forgive my ignorance, but I, for one, am curious.
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