Technology transforms Jewish education

Jewish Week

As rapidly advancing technology transforms virtually every sector of society, a diverse group of Jewish educational institutions — not generally thought of as early adapters — are increasingly turning their attention to digital tools and resources.

Whether distance learning or online gaming, Skype or Twitter, Google Earth (and a plethora of other free educational apps available at the click of a mouse) or iPads, SMART boards or Smartphones, QR codes or robotics, Jewish day schools and supplementary schools — and their funders — are struggling to sort the useful, cost-effective and engaging from the gimmicky, expensive and simply overwhelming.

Technology has headlined almost every major Jewish education gathering this year, from the North American Jewish Day School Conference (“The High Performance, High-Tech Jewish Day School of the Very Near Future”) to the Conservative movement’s Jewish Educators Assembly (“From Sinai to Cyberspace”) and Reform movement’s North American Association of Temple Educators (“Imagineering Jewish Education for the 21st Century”).

In June, both the Avi Chai Foundation, a major supporter of day schools, and PELIE, a group seeking to improve “complementary” Jewish education (better known as Hebrew school), for the first time sent delegations of teachers to the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Conference. Avi Chai also sent 10 educators to Games For Change, a conference promoting the use of computer games in education.

Orthodox groups clarify stance on reporting child abuse

JPost

Two Orthodox Jewish groups have released statements attempting to clarify their positions on reporting child abuse.

Agudath Israel of America and the Rabbinical Council of America were responding to what the former called “misleading claims about our stance on reporting suspected child abusers to law enforcement agencies.”

The statements come in the wake of criticism over comments by a leading American Orthodox rabbi, Shmuel Kamenetsky, that abuse should be reported to rabbis rather than police. Kamenetsky is the vice president of Agudah's Supreme Council of Rabbinic Sages.

Agudah in its statement referred to rabbinic arguments that authorities should be notified when a certain threshold of evidence is met, but “where the circumstances of the case do not rise to threshold level … the matter should not be reported to authorities.”

However, in order to distinguish whether the threshold has been met, the statement continued, “the individual shouldn’t rely exclusively on their own judgment … rather, he should present the facts to a Rabbi.” [...]

Jewish group promoting polygamy?

YNET

Synagogues across Israel flooded with tens of thousands of leaflets calling on Sephardic men to marry several women, claiming ancient custom now permissible under Jewish Law[...]

RCA requires reporting abuse to secular authorities

Rabbinical Council of America

RCA Reaffirms Halachic Requirement to Report Knowledge or Suspicion of Abuse or Endangerment to Secular Authorities Without Delay The Rabbinical Council of America has today reaffirmed its position that those with reasonable suspicion or first hand knowledge of abuse or endangerment have a religious obligation to report that abuse to the secular legal authorities without delay. One of the unique features of Jewish law is that it imposes upon every member of the community an obligation to help others avoid danger. The biblical verse “do not stand by while your neighbor’s blood is shed" is understood by Jewish Law to mandate that one must do all in one’s power to prevent harm to others - even if monetary harm, but certainly physical harm.

Consistent with that Torah obligation, if one becomes aware of an instance of child abuse or endangerment, one is obligated to refer the matter to the secular authorities immediately, as the prohibition of mesirah (i.e., referring an allegation against a fellow Jew to government authority) does not apply in such a case.

As always where the facts are uncertain one should use common sense and consultations with experts, both lay and rabbinic, to determine how and when to report such matters to the authorities. False accusations are harmful to those falsely accused – but unreported abuse

Talking to strangers? Rewriting the rules of childhood

Time

Long before Leiby Kletzky was gruesomely murdered in Brooklyn after the lost 8-year-old asked a man he didn't know for help earlier this month, I made sure my three kids knew my cell phone number my heart. Even the 4-year-old can rattle off the digits, but Leiby's death changed everything I thought I knew about stranger danger.

We teach our children not to talk to strangers, but — as in Leiby's case —sometimes they have to. After all, if they're lost, how are my kids ever going to be found unless they first approach a stranger to lend them a cell phone so they can call me?

 Perhaps, I realized — even as I wincingly told my kids that a boy my oldest child's age had been killed by a stranger — that “don't talk to strangers” truism needs to be revised.

I didn't tell my kids about Leiby's fate to scare them. I used it as an excuse to talk to them about strangers and how to interact with them. Because it's inevitable that they'll have to. My children don't have their own phones, so if they were ever lost, they'd have to ask a stranger for help. Look for someone in uniform is a tough concept for a 4-year-old to grasp; to her, a uniform could be a princess outfit. In fact, when recently discussing a fire escape plan for our family, I explained to her that although generally she shouldn't leap into the arms of muscular men she doesn't know, if one comes stomping through her house in the event of a fire, she shouldn't run and hide. It was all very confusing.

Intermarried couples try to raise Jewish children

JPost

Lisa Shimel, who is not Jewish, celebrated Christmas with her Jewish husband until their first child was born; now they’ve added Chanukah. Deb Morandi works at Jewish Family Services, where she introduces intermarried families to Judaism, though she is not Jewish.

Pat Luftman was a committee co-chair in her son’s Jewish preschool, but her Jewish husband was denied a board position because the couple was intermarried. The Rev. Eleanor Harrison Bregman accompanies her children and Jewish husband to synagogue on Saturday, then goes to church the next day on her own.

A growing number of non-Jewish parents in America who have no plans to convert are raising Jewish children, marrying Jewish spouses, building Jewish homes and playing active roles in the Jewish community. But without plans to join the faith officially, their place in the Jewish community can be a bit complicated.

“My husband has never asked me to convert, and I feel strongly that I won’t, so this is as far as it will go,” Morandi, an active member of her Reform congregation, Temple Etz Chaim in Franklin, Mass., said of her synagogue work.[...]

Vatican's plan for dealing with abuse fails in Ireland

CNN

The Vatican on Monday recalled its envoy to Ireland in the wake of a blistering report accusing church leaders of covering up extensive abuse of young people by priests.

Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza was recalled to Rome "for consultations with the (Vatican) Secretariat of State," the official Vatican Information Service said in citing a statement from the Roman Catholic Church's leadership.

The move came in reaction to this month's release of the Cloyne report about "allegations of abuse of minors by clergy ... and, in particular, in the wake of subsequent reactions."

Released July 13, the 421-page report into abuses in the diocese of Cloyne -- near the southern city of Cork -- demolished claims by the Catholic Church in Ireland that policies it put in place in 1996 had enabled it to get a handle on the problem. It details how complaints against 19 clerics in the diocese were dealt with between 1996 and 2009.

It also accused Bishop John Magee, who was responsible for policing abuse in his diocese, of not backing the policy himself and failing to take action against abusers.[...]

Rabbinical court wants woman jailed for refusing to accept divorce

Haaretz

In a rare move, the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court ordered a 59-year-old woman jailed this week for refusing for 15 years to accept a ritual divorce from her husband and release him from their marriage. 

Disputes over refusals to grant a get, or Jewish religious separation, are common, but usually involve a husband holding back the bill of divorce, making this a rare case. 

The woman, who lives in the center of the country, is refusing to accept the divorce from her husband because of an ongoing property dispute between the two. 

“I won’t take the get under any circumstances, even if they take me to jail,” the woman told Haaretz Monday. “I’m made of steel, you can’t break me.”[...]

Rav Shteinman opposed to elitist non-Beis Yaakov schools

5tjt

Rav Shteinman, upon seeing the list of students, asked why these particular young ladies were not accepted into the local Bais Yaakov.  The Avreichim quickly corrected Rav Shteinman and stated that it was not that they were not accepted.   Au contraire, these young ladies were from the finer families, a cut above the standard “Bais Yaakov” family.  The parents had willingly registered them in this elite school.

Rav Shteinman responded that, if that is the case, the plans for the school should be negated immediately.  The group attempted to explain to the Rosh Yeshiva the dire need for the new type of institution, but they were unable to budge Rav Shteinman.  They were stuck and had to scramble to register their daughters in the other Bais Yaakov institutions.

Word quickly spread throughout Yerushalayim.  There were other elite schools too, that were established for the same purpose.  Kollel Yungerleit flocked to Rav Shteinman, only to receive the same response, “There is no inyan whatsoever to be frummer than Bais Yaakov.  Anyone who registered their daughter at an elite school should negate the matter and re-register in the Bais Yaakov schools.”

Religious parties want inspection of secular institutions

JPost

 

Deputy Finance Minister Itzhak Cohen (Shas) is demanding that the Finance Ministry conduct inspections to secular cultural and educational institutions that receive state funding, in the same manner as is done to yeshivot.

Speaking with The Jerusalem Post on Sunday, Cohen's call came in the wake of a recent inspection at the Beit Shmaya yeshiva in Bnei Brak, where two men walked in on the head of the yeshiva in the middle of his weekly lesson to the entire student body, in what was perceived as a highly insensitive and disrespectful move. Following the incident, heads of yeshivot and haredi Knesset members convened on Saturday night and issued a call to the Finance Ministry, under which the inspections take place, to freeze the inspections for a week and draw up clear and respectful procedures for the inspections.[...]

Michael Specter: The danger of science denial

Briskman case: Reasons to refuse to give Get

Washington Post

Yisrael Briskman’s wife in Israel wanted a divorce, and a rabbinical court decided she should be granted one. But Briskman refused and fled to the United States, where the FBI says an Orthodox Jewish rabbi and his wife lured him to their New Jersey home, kidnapped him and said they’d bury him alive in the Pocono Mountains if he didn’t relent.

Briskman said he was kicked repeatedly in the ribs at the home in Lakewood, robbed and shown the dark body bag he’d soon inhabit if he didn’t free his wife from their marital bonds.

“For you to get used to the size,” Rabbi David Wax is quoted as saying in the criminal complaint leading to his surrender to the FBI this month.

If this Sopranos-style plot is true — which the Waxes deny — it is an anomaly. But it’s not uncommon for religious communities to use coercive tactics to pressure recalcitrant husbands into granting their wives a “get,” or religious divorce. Tactics run the gamut from denying social and religious privileges to using financial and legal leverage. [...]