Learning and Community: Jewish Supplementary Schools in the Twenty-First Century

3 | Between Entrepreneurship and Jewish Mission

chapter 3 Between Entrepreneurship and Jewish Mission The Making of a Chabad Hebrew School Jack Wertheimer with Serene Victor Ahalf century ago, at the height of the great expansion in the number of congregational schools across the United States, Arthur Hertzberg, a prominent Conservative rabbi, mordantly pronounced the membership of most synagogues to be little more than “the parent teacher association of the religious school.”1 Hertzberg recognized the extent to which Jews were joining congregations largely in order to provide a Jewish education for their children. Their own involvement with the synagogue seemed at best secondary. Congregations, in turn, came to understand the critical role of the school for recruiting members. They also were convinced that children would lead their elders back into the synagogue. The school thus became a barometer of success for the congregation at large: by definition, when a synagogue closed its Hebrew school, it was failing; a congregation with a growing religious school was a thriving synagogue. The leaders of the Chabad Hebrew school under study in this chapter have taken this lesson to heart, building their Jewish center around the life of the school. The school, declares the Chabad rabbi2 forthrightly, is the “anchor” of his Jewish center. As the school has grown to some 118 students ,3 it has drawn families to the Center. In this regard, the school functions much like other congregational schools. Where it differs is in the extent to which the Center is a wholly owned, family enterprise; if the Center fails, an extended family will lose its income. Moreover, as one Chabad rabbi has put it to me, these centers operate on “a different business model” than the typical American synagogue. They ask people to pay for services they use, such as the Hebrew School, and then engage in fundrais79 ❖ Job Name: 560670 PDF Page: txt_560670.p97.pdfdenisek ing for the rest. Both elements add a powerful entrepreneurial edge to the work of those who staff the Chabad school under study. But the business side of the enterprise alone does not explain the drive propelling the school’s teaching personnel. The school’s primary teachers serve as shluchim and shluchos,4 emissaries sent by the late Lubavitcher Rebbe and his outreach-oriented movement into the hinterlands of American Jewish society. As the school’s director has stated directly, she and her husband could have gone into business and remained in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, the international capital of their movement, where their ability to observe Judaism would have been far easier. Instead, they were driven by a mission to create an outpost of Jewish life, a center to win Jews back to authentic Judaism, a goal, they believe, no one else other than Chabad can attain. These twin motives—a strong sense of Jewish mission coupled with a keen entrepreneurial disposition—drive the educators who have dedicated their lives to the Chabad school, producing a noteworthy experiment in supplementary Jewish education. Setting the Tone School Ambience The Hebrew School under study is integral to the work of a particular Chabad Jewish Center located on the West Coast, one of nearly 110 such Centers in states bordering the Pacific Ocean alone.5 The school itself was ten years old when studied and therefore among the oldest of roughly 375 Hebrew Schools sponsored by Chabad Centers around the country, the vast majority of which were founded over the past decade.6 Housed in a former bank on a strip mall, and cater-corner to a Blockbuster video rental store, the Center was established in 1996. Its first home had formerly been a private school. This enabled the Chabad Center to signal its intention to create the right atmosphere for the Hebrew School and thereby underscored the centrality of the school to the Center’s operations. Now in its third home, the Center consists of a large all-purpose room used as a synagogue , meeting hall, activity center, and reception hall. From this three other rooms radiate, separated by folding partitions. In addition, the building houses a kitchen, often used for school activities, especially in preparation for upcoming holidays, and a modest office used by the rabbi. The open design matches the tone set by the Chabad rabbi and his wife, the school head. No sooner do students enter the building than they must pass the school director’s desk, festooned with photographs of smiling 80 Innovative Small Schools Job Name: 560670 PDF Page: txt_560670.p98.pdfdenisek [3.144.97.189] Project...