It’s been two years now, since Mayor Bill De Blasio promised to investigate accusations of subpar secular education at dozens of charedi schools.
The investigation began in the summer of 2015 after the advocacy group Young Advocates for Fair Education (Yaffed), a nonprofit pushing for better secular education in charedi yeshivas, sent the Department of Education a complaint accusing 38 yeshivas in Brooklyn and one in Queens of providing boys with subpar education.
According to YAFFED tens of thousands of chasidic boys aged 13 and over receive no secular education at all, and boys 12 and under only get about six hours of English and math instruction per week. (The Jewish Week did an extensive investigation into the issue. You can read it here.) Students are taught no science or social studies at all, the group says. In July, city officials told the Daily News that it would release an “interim report” on the investigation by Sept. 22. They would offer an estimate of when the final report would be completed.
Meanwhile the DOE has been using the investigation as a justification for denying Freedom of Information Act requests for information on the investigation from news organizations, including The Jewish Week and the Daily News.
At a Harlem Town Hall meeting on August 2, Abby Stein asked De Blasio the DOE is doing to make yeshivas accountable. Watch his response above.
