The nation’s first Jewish-themed taxpayer-funded charter school is set to open with approximately 430 students attending. The new Ben Gamla Charter School in Hollywood, FL.is a taxpayer-funded institution founded by the area’s former congressman, Peter Deutsch. Ben Gamla Charter School says it will offer two hours of instruction a day in Jewish-related topics, but not religion.
Although not a single class has been taught, the school is already generating great controversy among the 240,000 or so Jews living in Broward County, one of the nation’s largest concentrations of Israelis. Supporters of the school say it could serve as a regional and national model for providing families with a financially accessible option at a time when the overwhelming majority of non-Orthodox households are opting not to send their children to Jewish day schools. Some critics, on the other hand, worry that the school’s main contribution will be to serve as a road map for religious communities seeking to lower the wall separating church and state.
According to Ben Gamla’s director, a 37-year-old Orthodox rabbi named Adam Siegel, students will learn Hebrew, Jewish culture and Jewish history for two hours a day—though faculty will be forbidden from teaching Torah or prayer.
“I didn’t get hired for this job because I’m a rabbi,” Siegel told JTA. “Plenty of Orthodox Jews work as stockbrokers and lawyers without converting people. If you’re a math teacher, you focus on the math. It’s not my job to chase people and make them Jewish.”
As it turns out, Siegel says that his own four children will not be attending Ben Gamla. “I want them to learn Torah every day,” the Orthodox rabbi said. “I wouldn’t even consider sending them here.”
The Broward School Board, rejected Ben Gamla’s original curriculum, which utilized textbooks replete with menorahs, Stars of David and other religious symbols. Susan Onori, charter school coordinator said, “We felt that was inappropriate for a public school,” But, she added, the school made changes and is now in compliance with the law. “The Ben Gamla school is not religious in nature at all,” the school board official said. “We do not fund public religious schools in the state of Florida.” About 16,500 of the county’s 236,000 students currently attend charter schools, with 52 such institutions expected to be up and running by the time classes begin next month.
The new Jewish-themed school is named after Rabbi Joshua Ben Gamla, a first-century rabbi in ancient Israel who is credited with establishing the concept of public education.
The school will be monitored and have its charter revoked if it is found teaching Judaism. According to Onori, “They have a contract with us,” she said, “and the contract is very clear about separation of church and state.”
According to some, the school’s main detractors are backers of expensive private Jewish day schools terrified of losing students to Ben Gamla. “They effectively have been a monopoly in terms of delivering Hebrew-English education in Broward County, and now they feel their monopoly status is being threatened,” he said.
A champion of the charter-school movement during his time as a Democratic lawmaker in Congress, school founder Peter Deutsch said Ben Gamla is licensed to have 600 students, but because of space restrictions there can only be 430 for now. “We have an additional charter from Miami-Dade County for another 600 kids,” he added, “and our expectation is that we will be applying for more charters in Palm Beach County and, most likely, several places outside of Florida.”
Eighty percent of Ben Gamla’s students come from other public schools. “We have a lot of kids from Israel, but we also have Hispanic kids. Obviously, it’s a self-selected group,” Deutsch said. Of the 800-plus applicants, 37% listed Hebrew as their native language, while 17% listed Spanish, 5% French, 5% Russian and 0.5% Portuguese. He said it’s safe to say most of them are Jewish, though it is impossible to provide an exact figure because, as a public school, the institution is forbidden to ask applicants their religion.
An Israeli-born Hallandale woman, Tzipora Nurieli, has registered all three of her children at Ben Gamla, saving a combined $48,000 in annual tuition fees.
“I was supposed to send them to Hillel in North Miami Beach, but this school is the most amazing miracle that’s ever happened,” she raved. “It’s a combination of teaching my kids Hebrew, but also taking advantage of the public school system. This is like having the best of both worlds.”
Eric Stillman, chairman of the Broward County Jewish Federation, said he’s keeping a close watch on the new school. “We are concerned about the ability of the Broward School Board and its administration to monitor the Ben Gamla Charter School to maintain separation of church and state,” he said.
“I think there’s a legitimate concern that this model could pave the way for other faiths to propose similar schools structured around their culture and history.”
The school is managed by Academica, which currently runs 21 charter schools in Florida. According to Deutsch, the firm will receive roughly $5,000 per student from the Florida Department of Education. That’s about 95% of what the state would pay a regular public school. That works out to just over $2 million for Ben Gamla at current enrollment levels.
