An Expert Weighs In. But...

Chasidic Children (Commentary)

The defense of the Chasidic community goes on unabated. Article upon article has been authored by prominent representatives of Orthodoxy ranging from the Centrist OU to the Charedi Agudah. They all attempted to show how biased and flawed the New York Times expose on Chasidic education is. All of them painting an entirely different and highly positive picture. A people that ought to be highly admired rather than so severely  criticized.  

The latest such article was an opinion piece in Commentary by Yeshiva University Azrieli Graduate School Professor Moshe Krakowski – an expatriate Chicagoan who now lives in New York. (Not that there is anything wrong with that. I mention it only to say that I remember him from many years ago as the son of a friend that often Davens in the same daily Shachris Minyan I do.)  

Professor Krakowski goes a lot further in demonstrating – not only the Times bias - but the bias of just about all of the critics of Chasidim saying that their preconceived notions biased their findings. To put it the way Dr. Krakowski does: 

(Investigative) Reporters Eliza Shapiro and Brian M. Rosenthal throw around a lot of numbers to give the impression of in-depth reporting. But if you look more closely, it becomes obvious that they began with their findings and chose the numbers to match. 

He then goes about a lengthy description of why he thinks that bias exists. As well as describing how opposite this community is from the way they portrayed it. 

Even though he is an academic with impeccable credentials in a field that he has devoted much of his time and expertise to,  he is  as human as anyone else and surely subject to his own personal bias. Same as those investigative reporters. 

Nonetheless I know he is an honorable individual whose expertise makes his view important.  So I will stipulate that his points are valid.  And that all of the positive things he says about this community are true. But if one reads his article carefully, one will note that he doesn’t actually dispute many of the findings of the Times reporters. Such as the following point he made: 

These 275 activists and critics hold important views that deserve to be heard.

He counters that their study did not include the fact that vast majoirity of that community approves of their education as it is as it is.  but it is hard to fault the study since it s rather well known that most of Satmar type Chasidim generally are not willing to be interviewed by outsiders – which is why their views were not taken into account. But even if it is as Dr. Krakowski described, the fact is he conceded  that the critics deserve to be heard.

 Then there is his point about whether the funds allocated to them by the state are being used legitimately: 

Are Hasidic schools wrong to “claim” the end of the school day as child care? The Times can only insinuate here, since the article presents no evidence this isn’t a completely legitimate use of these funds.  

The fact that they are using government funds to pay for ‘the end of their school day’ (which is probably devoted to additional religious study ) instead of actual child care is deceptive – even if it is technically legitimate. Regardless of the Times unfair implication that they are taking away funds from other deserving students from poor neighborhoods - almost as though the Chasidim stole them. 

Then there is the following: 

There are substantial anecdotal data that Hasidic schools employed regular corporal punishment within recent memory, long after most American schools had abandoned the practice. Yet there’s also substantial anecdotal evidence that this is no longer the case, and that Hasidic schools have stepped back dramatically from corporal punishment in the past decade.  

Doesn’t the conflict between the anecdotal data deserve further study? It should certainly not be ignored.

Here is another important point  he conceded: 

Only one piece of hard data appears. In 2019, we are told, students at a dozen Hasidic schools uniformly flunked standardized tests in math and English, a worse outcome than for any other students in the state. These are real numbers… 

But he then explains it away with the following: 

Hasidic schools use their own internal metrics that they take more seriously than state tests, which means that it’s possible students sit for state exams pro forma without actually trying to succeed on them.  

Possible?  Yes.  But it is far more likely they did not do well because they never had any real instruction in those subjects. Nor should it matter that the results of other schools were not considered. Why should it matter that the students in other communities do as poorly or worse than these Chasidim did? The point is that the Chasidic students did poorly. That should be the concern. Not that others are worse.

Here is yet another point made in the Times noted by Professor Krakowski:

The article includes several long and tragic personal histories about Hasidic teenagers who tried to leave their communities and encountered serious obstacles because of how poor their English and math skills were.

He does not dispute that sad reality but then points to examples of Satmar Chasidim he knows that show it is not impossible for these poorly educated Chasdim to succeed: 

like ‘the Satmar linguist; or the Hasidic Ph.D. student in history; or the bio-engineer from the Bobov sect…’  

But then he immediately concedes that these are the exceptions. So I’m not exactly sure what his point is other than anything is possible.

There is a lot more in his article which should be read in its entirety. And as I said at the outset, I agree that the Times painted a biased and misleading picture of the Satmar type Chasidic world. They are indeed a lot more productive then the investigate report indicated. They are probably a lot happier with their lives than the dour picture painted by the Times. 

But as I keep saying the their failures should not be measured against their successes. A failure is still a failure that needs to be corrected. Failures that Dr. Krakowski actually conceded exist or at least the  accusations of which should be taken seriously and not papered over.

That most are successful may be true. But there are plenty whose lives could be substantially improved if they would just implement a secular curriculum that the vast majority schools in the rest of the Orthodox world has had for decades. 

Is there any question that being illiterate limits their income opportunities? Why defend a system that deliberately avoids literacy? Not to mention the fact that it speaks very poorly of Judaism when its most devout practitioners are perceived to be illiterate. There is no virtue in illiteracy.

All of these defensive articles are ignoring that 300 pound gorilla in the room. There is no excuse for perpetuating a environment that promotes illiteracy. That all of this community’s defenders ignore or minimize that does not serve the Chasidic community  – or the rest of Klal Yisroel - well at all.