Only 12 Percent of High School Age Children Receive Jewish Education

Of the 335,000 Jewish boys and girls of high school age in the United States, only about 42,000 get some kind of Jewish education, it was reported here today, at the 33rd annual conference of the National Council for Jewish Education. Of those receiving Jewish schooling, half study only one day a week. The remainder attend afternoon Hebrew high schools and all-day schools.

These figures were submitted by Professor David Rudavsky of New York University, and Samuel H. Dinsky, of the Jewish Education Committee of New York. There was a doubling of enrollment in the last ten years in the Hebrew high schools, they reported. They presented recommendations for intensifying the studies of those presently attending, and for special programs to be set up for the 85 percent of Jewish teen-agers not now receiving any Jewish secondary education.

A. Hillel Henkin, of New Haven, in his annual presidential message, urged that the Hebrew teaching profession be elevated economically; that Jewish education must be made more intensive; and that Judaism be brought into the Jewish home. Accreditation of better Jewish schools was discussed by Louis Schwartzman, of Miami. He urged high quality of educational personnel; a diversified educational structure to meet the varying needs of Jewish youth; and “meaningful relationships between the school and the community.”

Samuel J. Borowsky, general secretary of the NCJE, in presenting his report, urged that all organizations of Jewish educators, irrespective of ideologies, unite in behalf of the greater good for Jewish education.