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HISTORY The organization was established in New York City in 1944 at a time when the United States was at war with the Axis Powers and Europe's Jews were facing the Genocide of The Holocaust by the Nazis . Yet it was precisely at that time that the call went out, challenging the prevailing mood of the times, to establish a totally new network of Jewish day schools across North America. The originator and leading personality of this new idea was the Hungarin -born Rabbi Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz (who insisted in being addressed as "Mr. Mendlowitz") who was then serving as the head of the Yeshiva Torah Vodaas in Brooklyn. He was supported, encouraged and guided by a group of colleagues (mostly leading Eastern Europe an-born and educated Rosh Yeshiva s {Link without Title} ), such as Rabbi Aharon Kotler (1890-1962) the Rosh yeshiva of the Lakewood Yeshiva in New Jersey , Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik (1903-1993) of Yeshiva University , and other leading rabbis. PLANNING TORAH UMESORAH'S CONTRIBUTIONS TO JEWISH EDUCATION The founders of Torah Umesorah wanted to establish a different model of education that was not based on the up-till-then accepted practice whereby Jewish parents sent their children to government non-sectarian Public School s during the day and then in the afternoons or on Sundays would send their children to Cheder or Talmud Torah -type Jewishly-run schools as had once been done in Europe -- but which now in the modern New World were failing to transmit Judaism in a compelling and lasting manner to students who arrived tired in the afternoons, and who were also subjected to the Secular izing forces in general American society and culture in public school, on the street, and at home. Thus the rabbis envisioned the birth of dual- Curriculum Jewish Day School s that would provide both a Judaic (Jewish or Torah religious) education for half the day and a good secular education all under one roof in one building or complex. Each new school was to be guided by an Ordained rabbi who would serve as the headmaster or principal and who would also recruit a "general studies" associate principal (also known as the "English principal"), preferably someone who was also loyal to the traditions of Judaism, who would then recruit, assist, supervise and guide teachers who would be teaching the same secular subjects taught in the public schools. OPPOSITION TO TORAH UMESORAH The idea was not popular in some quarters because by the middle of the twentieth century most American Jews were affiliated with the Conservative Judaism and the Reform Judaism movements, the latter in particular being strongly opposed to any moves that they viewed as a return to the ancient and discarded Jewish " Ghetto s" and sectarianism. FACTORS FAVORING TORAH UMESORAH'S ESTABLISHMENT However, there were enough parents who were sold on the idea particularly as the shock of the enormity of The Holocaust (of World War II ) set in and since over half a million United States Jews had served in the US Armed Forces and witnessed the horrors of Anti-Semitism for themselves many were sympathetic to the rabbis' calls for a moderate Jewish education, at least until the Bar Mitzvah age (12-13) of their children. Another important factor at the time was the highly emotional Jewish pride that was felt by many Jews following the establishment of the new State of Israel with the United States being the first to recognize the new Jewish state. Many American Jews now felt that they needed to provide the means for their children to learn the Hebrew Language connected with the Hebrew Bible the core of Judaism , even teach Religious Zionism that would connect the children and their families with pride in Israel, and simultaneously not neglect a secular education as citizens of the United States living in an open society, with hopes and plans for attending College in the future as well. The new Jewish days schools were seen as the perfect means to serve as the educational vehicles to accomplish the new goals of all-day Jewish schooling -- or, all-day schooling under Jewish religious auspices -- whereas in the past the Cheders and Talmud Torahs were judged to be failures because they did not manage to adequately inspire and prepare the Jewish children who attended them for Jewish religious adulthood. (Once Torah Umesorah was established, and its affiliated schools were attracting students, the same criticism would be levelled at parents who withdrew their children as they reached adolescence and were then sent to government-run public school high schools rather than making the sacrifices of attending Jewish high schools.) OTHER ORTHODOX EFFORTS The organization was set up at a time when another major Orthodox group, the after Rabbi J.I. Schneersohn's arrival in the United States in 1940. Subsequently this spurred-on those not affiliated with Chabad, as they began a parallel process of recruiting students and establsihing Jewish schools in whichever Jewish communities they could do so. In the New York - New Jersey metropolitan area, particularly in many areas of Brooklyn , various Hasidic and Haredi groups (such as Satmar , Bobov , Vizhnitz and many others) attracted many new supporters for Yeshiva education that was more intensive than the Jewish day school model being promoted by Torah Umesorah to the American heartland. The impetus came largely from Holocaust survivors who arrived in the United States during the 1940s and 1950s (such as the Lithuanian Mir Yeshiva ) who had no wish to emulate the educational goals of secular (Jewish) society, feeling that they had been betrayed by the outside world during the Holocaust. They therefore responded to calls to send their children to Yeshiva s (for the boys) and Bais Yaakov s (for the girls) that barely provided any secular education beyond the "3Rs" ("reading, writing and arithmetic") with most of the time devoted entirely to Talmud and Rabbinical Literature (for the boys) and study of Tanakh and Jewish laws and customs (for the girls) all combined with fervent and intense Jewish Worship . The new institutions thrived in their own right and mostly followed the guidelines of their own Rosh Yeshiva s and Rebbe s who did not look to Torah Umesorah for any guidance. At times they may have asked Torah Umesorah for help with obtaining financial grants, but not with anything to do with curriculum issues. Towards the latter part of the twentieth century, as those Torah Umesorah affiliated schools that aligned themslves with Modern Orthodoxy grew disenchanted with Torah Umesorah's tilt towards Haredi Judaism , a new trend developed whereby teachers and rabbis from the Haredi and Hasidic schools began to look to Torah Umesorah for training in improving Classroom Management , enhancing classroom Discipline and learning up-to-date Teaching skills and techniques that they had not formally received during their yeshiva training. FIRST DIRECTOR AND BUILDING JEWISH DAY SCHOOLS See Also: Jewish day school After its founding, Torah Mesorah appointed a full time director in of Baltimore, the Telshe Yeshiva of Cleveland , the Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin and Yeshiva Torah Vodaas in Brooklyn and a few others, whose graduates then set out to transmit the heritage of Torah Study , study of Mishnah , Talmud and Jewish Law And Customs , Hebrew Language , Jewish History , inculcating a love and desire for celebrating and enjoying the Jewish Holiday s, Shabbat and the Mitzvot ("commandments"). By the end of the 1960s about five hundred schools had been established with close to one hundred children, and were officially affiliated with their "national organiztion" Torah Umesorah. Those statistics included children in yeshivas in the New York area as well that had been set up and affiliated with Torah Umesorah, but every community with about over ten thousand Jews would have at least one Jewish day school. Dr Kaminetsky retired in 1980 . SPLIT WITH THE MODERN ORTHODOX By the 1980s and 1990s there was a split in the movement when the Modern Orthodox community pushed for the establshment of day-school type high schools. However because Torah Umesorah is guided by a rabbinical board of advisors who are also the core of the Haredi Agudath Israel Of America rabbinic leadership, they do not condone Coeducation beyond the eighth grade (some even earlier) and since almost all the Jewish day schools consist of both boys and girls as students, with most classes in Judaism conducted separately, who combine for the secular studies classes, the rabbis could therefore not give their approval to high schools run along such (co)educational lines they deemed to be against traditional Torah education (''chinuch''). The desired model for the rabbis and the Rosh Yeshiva s who guide them is for boys who graduate eighth grade to continue in all-male traditional Yeshiva s (" Talmud ical academies") and for the girls to study at Bais Yaakov ("Beth Jacob") type schools. Almost all Modern Orthodox parents and communal leaders rejected this position and chose instead to create a network of Modern Orthodox Jewish day schools known as Association Of Day Schools And Yeshiva High Schools (AMODS) affiliated and staffed by Yeshiva University and performing the same functions as Torah Umesorah. FACING COMPETITION FROM THE NON-ORTHODOX MOVEMENTS In the 1990s and 2000s Torah Umesorah faced new challenges as the known as " Solomon Schechter Schools" drawing away many children from quite a few formerly Orthodox schools and in some instances forcing the closure of Torah Umesorah affiliated schools. The other non-Orthodox streams also began building Jewish schools, although many of these schools also admitted non-Jewish children, often from the mixed-marriages of some of the parents. NEW ENDEAVORS: SEED PROGRAMS, KOLLELS, AND PARTNERS-IN-TORAH In response Torah Umesorah began to look towards other means to achive its ends and adopted a strategy of encouraging Adult Education . Under "Project SEED" hundreds of yeshiva students have been recruited and sent on two-week Summer trips to many far-flung smaller Jewish communities. "Partners in Torah" matches Orthodox Jews to study with a less-learned study parner in a distant community either over the phone, and if possible in person. There are several thousand active "partnerships" in this program. Torah Umesorah has taken a leading role in breaking ground and finding the funding for the establishemnt of out-of-town Kollel s ("post-graduate Talmud ic]] schools') in any community that is willing to set up the infrstructure and host such efforts. Some of the young rabbis and their wives ( Rebbetzin s) have then subsequently taken full-time and part-time positions as Jewish educators in the local day schools, as well as opting to serve in local Orthodox Synagogue s as "puplit rabbis" and in some instances even founding and developing new Jewish day schools and synagogues of their own, similar to way Chabad rabbis have done over the years. SERVICES PROVIDED BY TORAH UMESORAH
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