New York Moves To Cut Funding To Public Universities While Adding Millions Of Dollars In Aid For Yeshiva Students

The state budget plan that moved toward enactment on Wednesday calls for 10 percent cuts in aid to public colleges and universities, but it would add about $18 million a year in tuition assistance for students attending some private religious schools, primarily yeshivas.

 

Some Rabbinical Students to Get State Tuition Aid
By PAUL VITELLO • New York Times

The state budget plan that moved toward enactment on Wednesday calls for 10 percent cuts in aid to public colleges and universities, but it would add about $18 million a year in tuition assistance for students attending some private religious schools.

The added money would be available to any theological student who met a new set of criteria for the state's so-called Tuition Assistance Program grants. The major potential beneficiaries would be an estimated 5,000 men who attend dozens of Orthodox rabbinical schools in New York, state officials and religious leaders said.

Assemblyman Dov Hikind, a Democrat whose Brooklyn district includes a large Orthodox population, called the additional financing "a matter of equity, to rectify the fact that New York State has denied rabbinical college students tuition assistance for all these years."

Mr. Hikind and other lawmakers have sought unsuccessfully for about 10 years to adopt the new criteria by amending the Tuition Assistance Program rules, eliminating a long-established ban on state tuition assistance for undergraduate students who attend religious schools, like yeshivas, that are not chartered by the state Board of Regents.

In negotiations this month, Republican leaders in the Senate asked that the new rules be included as part of the 2011-12 budget agreement. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Democratic leaders in the Assembly have agreed, said Jeffrey Gordon, a spokesman for the State Division of the Budget.

Some opponents of the rule changes have said they violate the spirit, if not the letter, of the Constitution.

Joseph Conn, a spokesman for the Washington-based Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, said his group had tracked legislative efforts to extend state tuition aid to religious students in New York.

"By burying this measure in a budget bill, we were caught off guard," he said.

Assemblywoman Deborah Glick, a Manhattan Democrat who is the chairwoman of the state Assembly's Higher Education Committee, said last year that she opposed expanding eligibility to students attending private institutions while the state was cutting spending and reducing access to public institutions. Ms. Glick did not return phone calls on Wednesday about whether she backed the change this year. David Zweibel, executive vice president of Agudath Israel of America, an Orthodox Jewish advocacy group that has lobbied for the new rules in tuition aid, said the new regulations did not violate church-state separation because the aid would go directly to the student, not to the religious institution.

"To those who have said, 'How can you ask for this in these tough economic times?' " he added, "My answer is, yes, it's a tough time. But it's about time." Students attending religious colleges are no less in need of tuition assistance than any others, he added.

Students who meet the financial eligibility and other requirements for Tuition Assistance Program grants may receive up to $5,000 a year for four years.

Under the new rules, students can apply for grants from the program as long as the school they attend is a tax-exempt institution, headquartered in New York, offering a program of instruction of at least three years, and eligible under federal law for Pell grants for undergraduate study. The federal tuition assistance program does not exclude students studying for the clergy.

The new New York criteria would, however, continue to exclude students of most seminaries, which accept only students who have completed college.

"The way the rules were written, they were pretty much designed" for the undergraduate yeshivas, said Mr. Gordon, of the governor's budget office.

Mr. Zweibel, of Agudath Israel, said he was confident that others besides rabbinical students would benefit from the expansion of the eligibility rules. He said the state had been inconsistent in its policies until now.

"In a state that has been so hospitable to the growth of its Orthodox minority," he said, "and with the largest group of rabbinical colleges in the country right here in New York, how could the state say to our students that no, you are not eligible for what everyone is eligible to receive?"

[Hat Tips: CS, AEA.]

Comments

[curiousity]

Separation of church and state is vital. Dov Hikind and David Greenfield are doing us a big disservice. This is politics at its very worst, blind and reckless pandering without foresight for the terrible ramifications this can cause.

[ruthie]

block voting...
never mind that these universities are educating the next generation of dr.'s, nurses, scientists, teachers, engineers, leaders...
BLOCK VOTING...

[yidandahalf]

NY taxes are unaffordable; the state is bleeding the taxpayers of every drop in order to support the parasites. And it seems to be working; the latter are indeed thriving and going from strength to strength.

[Devorah]

With the Yeshivas' histories of lying about student attendance, what is going to happen when the students receive the money and are not even attending school, but their names will still be on the books?

Big fraud potential...I bet they are planning it now!

In Rockland county, the New Square groupies falsified SS numbers and collected millions of dollars in grant money at Rockland Community College. Clinton then pardoned them.

[Gevezener Chusid]

Something has to be done about Pell, TAP, and other grant abuse. Yeshivas have been bilking the system for years (I was last in Yeshiva about 30 years ago and it was rampant then). I would look at how many "graduates" of these yeshiva "colleges" are collecting public assistance 5 years after "graduation" and apportion the grants in inverse proportion. Obviously, these institutions are not providing any marketable skills to their students that will benefit the State or the Country as a whole, and there is no reason why taxpayers should have to foot the bill.

[marrtin nerl]

wow. i just saw the same story on a pro-hareide website and the headline was,"even in times of budget cutting , all students are now being treated the same". i guess the same story can be understood both ways depending on your agenda

[EM]

The teachers unions also came out ahead from the budget deal. So did the healthcare unions. So did all the public sector unions for that matter.

Fuck the unions.

All they do is squeeze the taxpayer for more and more money.

Fuck them.

[curiousity]

marrtin nerl, "separation of church and state" is important,for all people despite their religion or lack thereof. Hey though, everyone should look out for their own though. I mean you won't mind paying for future imams, priests, druids, or seedy solipsists to study. Right? EM, These aggressive,regressive, oppressive, repressive ,attitudes about basic collective bargaining, work conditions, unions and health care will be the undoing of this country. We are turning into a third world country.

[Bin dere dun dat]

Stop the baloney and crap of seperation of church and State. Why and how does this differ from St.John's University or Loyola who give Bachellor - Masters or Doctorates in Divinity or Religion. There are hundreds of colleges in the United States that give degrees in the christian religion that are fully eligible and receive funding for Pell and TAP. Why pick on Rabbinical students.
You are a filthy bloody anti-frum, anti-religious and thereby anti jewish blog and so are the antisemetic comments.

[A E ANDERSON]

IT'S TIME FOR THE POST-SECONDARY YESHIVAS TO PRACTICE TRUTH IN EDUCATION

As long as the yeshivas actually grant the degrees they tell the government they're granting, and follow the published curricula of their official catalogues and in their institutional self studies, I see no harm in this. In fact, it might force greater compliance. There is educational value in a yeshiva Talmudic education, and that education, when properly delivered, is worthy of formal recognition.

The problem is that most yeshivas don't see it that way. In order to get government money, and for no other reason, they have created the paper illusion that they are tertiary educational institutions on the model of American colleges, with credit hour courses, transcripts and degrees.

Some yeshivas have carefully reviewed their actual curricula, and drafted catalogues that legitimately correspond. For others, the paper veneer of academia is a creation out of whole cloth performed by a consultant.

I think the true test is whether the catalogue that the yeshiva gives the accreditor and the government is a real document that students are given, and from which they choose courses and otherwise consult on academic matters.

I know of no yeshiva that automatically grants its degrees to graduates upon graduation. Instead, their qualifications are something issued when individual students later ask for it, and it is often issued on criteria beyond that published (e.g., an additional fee or donation). Sometimes it is withheld because the yeshiva's hanhola believe the graduate will use the degree to attend secular university and "go frei."

Despite this, every Pell Grant yeshiva reports attendance and graduation data annually to the US Department of Education, this information being used to tally graduation rates. If an institution does not meet a certain threshhold in its graduation rate, its institutional eligibility can be withheld. This means that most yeshivas are reporting graduations that never occurred as they have not actually graduated the individual student and issued them with transcripts, diploma or even letters indicating graduation.

(The yeshivas engaging in this practice, i.e., most of them, would no doubt counter that the students in question were graduated, even if they had no idea they had even received a degree. Ha!)

There is much opposition on the part of some yeshiva faculty to their students receiving academic degrees. The reason range from the banal ("thou shalt not walk in their ways") to the paranoid (the degree is a ticket to freikeit and non-observance). For this reason, some yeshivas grant a "First Talmudic Degree" instead of a bachelors.

All in all, the more that yeshivas are helped to becoming law abiding citizens, the better.

[curiousity]

I see. Bin dere dun dat, you didn't really read my post. Well,I DON'T think separation of church and state is bologna; if separation of church and state is ignored, it will eventually hinder our freedom to practice, or not practice, our religions, or lack thereof. Our public tax dollars should not be used for this. Just because I disagree with you, you call me anti-Semetic? That's sad.

[reb chaim]

What a travesty. Our beloved orthodox legislators Shelly Silver and Dov Hikind have done it again. They have managed to secure a piece of the pie for their constituents at the expense of almost everyone else in New York State. Hopefully not too many of these needy yeshiva students who will undoubtedly contribute much to the economuy of New York State after they "graduate" will be clever enough to take advantage of this latest largesse.

[Nigritude Ultramarine]

Why pick on Rabbinical students.

Because, according to the article, one of the main objections is that these "seminaries" are not chartered by the New York State Board of Regents.

Why and how does this differ from St.John's University or Loyola who give Bachellor - Masters or Doctorates in Divinity or Religion.

In a word -- accreditation. Real accreditation, with actual professors, grades, and attendance requirements. All of this increases the likelihood of good stewardship of the taxpayers' money.

Take St. John's University as an example. The university is accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools and has 13 specialized accreditations. Whereas, there are probably 13 yeshiva dormitories, due to gross mismanagement, should have their certificates of occupancy withdrawn -- right now.

There are seven accreditors involved in higher education accreditation for degree-granting institutions of higher education in the U.S. -- six regional, and the New York State Board of Regents.

The Jewish "seminaries" have AARTS -- recognized by none of the aforementioned accreditors.

[A E ANDERSON]

AARTS is a national, specialised, faith-related accrediting agency recognised by the Commission on Higher Education and the US Dept. of Education. See Directory of CHEA-Recognized Organizations 2010-2011.

CHEA recognises some 60 accrediting agencies, ranging from the regionals, to AARTS, the Association of Theological Seminaries (ATS), and the programmatic accrediting agencies that accredit, as you mention above, specific graduate and professional programs (e.g., the Liason Committee for Medical Education, accreditor of med schools).

I think you don't grasp a key detail about accreditation in the American context: it is peer accreditation rather than supervision by a regulatory body. An institution opens itself up by means of a self-study process to a committee of represenatives from peer institutions. The accrediting committee visits and meets with stakeholders (admins, faculty, staff, students, alumni, etc.), whilst reviewing the self-study document as a road map.

A new institution or program enters a period of tutelege (usually provisional or probationary accreditation) until such time as it can effect the changes and improvements recommended by the visiting accrediting committee. At the end of the process, which spans years, full peer accreditation is either granted or withheld.

Each of the AARTS institutions has undergone this lengthy, difficult process. AARTS requires its accredited institutions to undergo self-study review process: adminstrators, faculty, alumni (and to a lesser extent students) must be involved, in person. Members of the visiting accrediting committee include faculty and roshei yeshiva from already-accredited AARTS institutions.

AARTS turns down institutions that don't meet its standards, that refuse to conduct honest self-studies, or that otherwise bring the yeshiva world into disrepute. One of the key factors in their selection is institutional viability: you cannot expect to open a bet medrash in your basement, recruit some bachurim and expect to have an accredited, degree granting institution. AARTS has a rule against accrediting stand-alone semicha programs: they want to see ongoing institutions that offer a full-spectrum Orthodox Talmudic education, that have well-respected, accomplished faculty, and that are financially viable in the long term.

AARTS institutions all have a system of student progression and grading that is reviewed during accreditation visits. They would have to have this and address this issue in their institutional self study.

It would not be the function of an accrediting agency to condemn a dormitory. But if public authorities had done so, or if there was felt to be a need for additional dormitory space, that would be mentioned and commented on in the institutional self-study and its periodic updates.

I have long wondered whether yeshivas would benefit from regional accreditation. Until such time as they offer liberal arts programs as an add on to the bet midrash, I cannot see what the role of a regional would be in reviewing a yeshiva program that is beyond their experience, understanding or comprehension. That is why the specialised agencies exist.

[A E ANDERSON]

... I DON'T think separation of church and state is bologna...

The Bologna Process doesn't address church and state, to my knowledge, but speaks to the correlation of degree styles and nomenclature among disparate national educational systems.

[marrtin nerl]

curiousity. are you afraid of tax-deductible donations to jewish organizations because that deduction also goes to christian and muslim charities? freedom of religion is for all religions.this tap will also help all religions.what's the difference? should there be a law against wearing yamakas and shaitels because that freedom is also used to allow burka wearing?

[Yoel Mechanic]

>and eligible under federal law for Pell grants for undergraduate study. The federal tuition assistance program does not exclude students studying for the clergy.

this was the key sentence. I'm glad to see that A Anderson grasped it.

[Nigritude Ultramarine]

It would not be the function of an accrediting agency to condemn a dormitory.

I agree, I just mentioned that because it would speak to the financial viability to an institution.

it is peer accreditation rather than supervision by a regulatory body.

I'm aware of that because CHEA took great pains to point out about 10 years ago that colleges and universities are not the sole providers of teaching and learning in higher education and they need to be mindful of how to serve the public interest when it comes to accommodating transfer students from non-traditional educational venues. Yet, I don't know how one could go from my AARTS "accredited" yeshiva to a "professional" school without lying and forging documents.

For example, after seven years in my yeshiva, I never received a report card, transcript, or a degree. AARTS showed up one time for an inspection and someone told me, you work in the library on such and such days if anyone asks. The funny thing is, we had a library, but it remained locked, as it was used for a private study for certain rabbis. Anyway, I declined the offer to serve as "librarian" since it sounded too much like conspiracy.

Back to my point, after I left, I met up with one of my cohorts. I found out he is a captain in the U.S. Army -- serving as a chaplain. That's odd, I thought, I never met anyone from our yeshiva who was ever ordained; and one needs a degree to earn a commission and to be a chaplain. FWIW, he's a major now. I don't remember "Lying 525" in the course catalog.

Recently, I learned another cohort received a law degree from Hofstra. Impressive. I figured he must have gotten his undergrad at Brooklyn College. Nope, he received an Bachelors of Hebrew Letters -- an imaginary degree -- from our AARTS accredited yeshiva.

BTW, the crack investigators from AARTS never did ferret out the "Potemkin village" student library.

[Barry]

The relationship of yeshivas to robust tertiary education is similar to that of the Happy Endings Massage Parlor in the East 20's to Physiotherapy Department at Mount Sinai Medical Center. You will find couches and people in white coats in both establishments.

[curiousity]

marrtin nerl, I'm sorry I didn't make my point more lucidly and went a little off the deep end. In reply to your questions, I believe how people dress is a personal choice, and would never impinge upon this freedom, just as I wouldn't impinge upon someone's freedom to worship or not worship in the manner they see fit and in accordance with the laws that govern this country.

[Gevezener Chusid]

Being the once rare yeshiva student who was fluent in written standard English, I once worked on concocting the "self study" for one of the AARTS accredited schools. It was pure b.s. from start to finish as far as the particulars are concerned - i.e. actual courses, credit hours, etc...HOWEVER the fact is that anyone who studied in that institution for 4 or 5 years would indeed have covered all of the "required" material. So basically it was b.s. as far as technicalities go, and not as far as realities go, and while the institution may have been lying about technicalities, they were not really lying as far as providing the education they claimed to provide.

I believe that study for the clergy should NOT receive any funding, no matter what religion we are discussing. Religion-owned property should be taxed like any other business.