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Journal of Jewish EducationPublication details, including instructions for authorsand subscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ujje20

Old Challenges — New ChallengesAlvin I. SchiffPublished online: 13 Mar 2008.

To cite this article: Alvin I. Schiff (1983) Old Challenges — New Challenges, Journal ofJewish Education, 51:3, 2-2, DOI: 10.1080/15244118308547981

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15244118308547981

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EDITORIAL COMMENTS

OLD CHALLENGES — NEW CHALLENGES

Jewish Education as a Career — Attracting talented young people to Jewish educationalcareers is a critical challenge. Retaining them is ofttimes more problematic. Maximizing theirpotential is even more difficult. Meeting each of these challenges requires money and ingenui-ty. Attracting and retaining have received much attention — not enough, to be sure — duringthe last few years. While money is not the total answer to the problem, one cannot obtain bettertalent and retain effective personnel without additional funding.

While the day school and yeshiva provide full-time positions, these schools will not be ableto attract talented young people without offering a living wage and the promise of career ad-vancement. More funding is also needed to respond to many dimensions of the personnel chal-lenge in supplementary schools, to (1) improve entry level salaries; (2) convert Jewish teachinginto a full-time profession; and (3) enhance the level of knowledge of the growing number ofteachers with minimal Judaic backgrounds.

Excellence cannot be achieved if the largest proportion of teachers is part and part-part-timepersonnel — no matter how motivated and enthusiastic they are. This requires a redefinition ofthe teacher's role. Much has been said and written about making the teaching profession afull-time profession. Making the teacher a family educator will help provide full-time posi-tions. This requires dollars as well as a creative approach to staffing. On the other hand, wemust realize that for some communities and some personnel, the part-time nature of Jewishschool teaching is a welcome feature.

For all personnel, the key challenge is making the Jewish education profession—particular-ly teaching — an attractive, competitive, satisfying career. Here the response must bemultifaceted. It requires creative, cooperative efforts between all segments of the Jewish com-munity and readiness to support dramatic changes in teacher training, recruitment, retention,instructional standards and growth possibilities.

Teachers and Technology — Formal education is a very personal activity. The core of theprocess is interaction between teacher and student. As teachers increasingly utilize the growingvariety of interactive technologies available for the classroom they will spend less time inter-acting with pupils. It is clear, however, that hardware and software will never (read "can"never) replace the teacher. Here the challenge to teachers is to integrate the new learning realiainto the teaching-learning process without diminishing their personal interactive roles.

Lay Professional Roles — With the growing attention being paid to Jewish education in theJewish community and the surfacing of education as a key national, state and local issue, laypeople are bound to become increasingly involved. This development will augur well for themaintenance and progress of formal Jewish schooling. Indeed, Jewish education direly needsmore active, supportive laity. The challenge here is to define the respective roles of lay andprofessional leadership so that professionals and lay leaders can work in tandem and under-stand and appreciate each other's responsibilities and potential contributions.

v ALVIN I. SCHIFF

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