Jewish Org's Statement on Proposed New York State Equivalency Regulations for Yeshivos

The New York State Education Department on Thursday released new proposed regulations that would mandate how private schools teach secular studies. The new regulations abandon the previous mandate of a minimum number of hours of study of specific courses, but retain its charging of local school districts with oversight over private schools that aren’t pre-accredited.

 Hamodia.com reports Yeshiva advocates deem the new regulations a slight improvement over those proposed in 2018, but still oppose governmental oversight of private and religious schools. “While we recognize that the proposed regulations are less intrusive than the two versions that preceded it, we remain disappointed,” yeshiva advocacy group PEARLS said in a statement Thursday. “Government does not possess either the expertise or the ability to evaluate our limudei kodesh classes or those who teach them, yet these regulations require local school districts to do just that. SED [the State Education Department] heralds the possibility of third-party accreditation, but our repeated request that SED approve an accrediting agency that is familiar and experienced with yeshiva education were ignored.”

Agudah statement:

Agudath Israel of America acknowledges the New York State Education Department’s release today of proposed new regulations regarding “substantial equivalence” of instruction. We will be studying these proposed regulations closely in the days ahead, but at first glance we note that they represent an improvement over the version that SED proposed in 2019 — most notably, by establishing a series of alternate pathways to substantial equivalency. This is a positive development.

We also appreciate the proposed regulations’ explicit instruction that “Reviews shall be informed by, and respectful of, the cultural and religious beliefs and educational philosophy that may drive the curriculum in nonpublic schools and be integrated with academic content in the delivery of instruction.” This is an important foundational principle.

Yet despite these positive features of the proposed new regulations, we remain deeply concerned about the impact these regulations may have on many yeshivas across New York State. Most dismayingly, and despite numerous entreaties by Agudath Israel and other advocates for the yeshiva community, nowhere in the proposed regulations is there any mention of the need to take into account the educational value of religious studies in determining substantial equivalency. Yeshiva students devote long hours to the study of the Chumash, Mishnah, Talmud and various other religious texts – a course of study that is well known to be a rigorous academic discipline of the highest order. For a yeshiva to be judged on the quality of its educational program without taking into account these religious studies would make a cruel mockery of the review process. By ignoring this essential component of yeshiva education, the proposed new regulations may result in yeshivas having to make major changes to their school day schedules to be deemed substantially equivalent. This is entirely unacceptable.

We will continue to engage the SED and Board of Regents as the regulatory process moves forward, in the hope that any new regulations will fully respect the unique nature and essential role of yeshiva education. The stakes are high, and we cannot afford to sit on the sidelines.