Jewish Schools in America Have Budgets Cut Owing to Economic Depression: Teachers ‘salaries Unpaid a

Jewish educational agencies in the United States have been compelled to reduce their budgets this year from ten to twenty-five per cent. as a result of the economic depression, Mr. Alexander M. Duskhin, Executive Director of the Jewish Board of Education in Chicago, has reported to the National Conference of Jewish Social Service.

The economic depression, he states, has already affected all Jewish schools. Its effect has been most disastrous in the case of those schools which are not affiliated with the central communal organisations. In the case of the un-coordinated and unaffiliated Jewish schools, the teachers’ salaries have not been paid for seven months and more; schools have been shut down because of the non-payment of salaries; drastic reductions have been made in teachers’ salaries; strikes have been declared by teachers because they have not been receiving their salaries and schools have been closed down because of their inability to carry on.

The situation is better in the schools affiliated with the central communal educational agencies, he proceeded, but there, too, the income from tuition fees has in many cases decreased to 35 per cent. In communities like Chicago, New York, Detroit and Baltimore, the subsidy to communal educational agencies has been reduced by 10 per cent. On the other hand, in cities like St. Louis, Cincinnati and Boston, the community funds are so badly hit that the educational budgets have been reduced by 33 per cent. and over.

Fifteen communities, including all the large Jewish cities in the United States, with a Jewish population of about three million, have reported that the income from their central communal funds or similar sources has decreased from 7 to 50 per cent., the average decrease being 20 per cent.