NYS Education Dept. directs families at 3 Brooklyn yeshivas to find another way to educate their children
The New York State Education Department is instructing families at a few Brooklyn yeshivas to find other schools — the first major test of how education officials will enforce controversial regulations of failing religious programs.
Parents have until July 1 to find an 'appropriate educational setting' for their children and notify the local school district of their new enrollment status, according to a letter template shared with the Daily News.
Their former schools will be cut off from all public funds — for child nutrition programs, transportation, textbooks and other services — in what advocates suggested was a new phase of a years-long effort to ensure all students graduate with basic skills in core subjects, such as English and math.
The schools are two locations of Yeshiva Bnei Shimon Yisroel of Sopron, and Talmud Torah of Kasho, the Education Department confirmed. The trio, all in Williamsburg, had been found out of compliance with state regulations that oversee the quality of instruction at religious and independent schools.
Under state law, all private schools must provide students with an education that is at least 'substantially equivalent' to that offered by a public school.
'This is an unprecedented and important step,' said Adina Mermelstein Konikoff, executive director of Young Advocates for Fair Education, or YAFFED. 'For the first time under these regulations, NYSED has formally notified a school that it no longer meets the standards for providing compulsory education.
'It is unfortunate that it has come to this but every child has the right to a 'substantially equivalent' education, and we hope that this will be a wakeup call for the non-compliant schools to follow state law.'
Local and state education officials determined the three yeshivas were out of compliance in 2023. The schools were given 60 days before any extensions to work with the city on remediation plans.
J.P. O'Hare, a spokesman for the Education Department, said the schools did not respond or engage with education staffers. The yeshivas represent a small number of the many Jewish day schools in New York otherwise providing a quality education.
In the letter template from the state's Office of Religious and Independent School Support, parents were given a choice: Find a different religious school, enroll in public school, or supplement with home school while monitored by the district. The memo was translated into Yiddish and given to yeshivas to distribute among their families, though it was unclear if school leaders were distributing the memo in full under department letterhead.
The schools did not respond to a request for comment.
The state regulations have been at the center of a bitter legal battle involving a separate group of yeshivas. In 2023, a trial court judge ruled the Education Department could not force families to yank their children out of noncompliant schools, effectively forcing the programs to shutter. New York's highest court will soon weigh in on the matter after a panel of appeals judges decided there must be consequences.
But some school leaders are not waiting. Last month, several yeshivas filed a federal discrimination complaint a week before President Trump's inauguration, asking the civil rights office of the U.S. Education Department to intervene in what they see as an attempt to impose secular views on Jewish schools.
It was not clear if the Trump administration had initiated an investigation, though the office has indicated that allegations of antisemitism would be a priority. A publicly available list of open probes, which had been updated weekly, was last revised on Jan. 14.
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