Integrative education in Israel – an essential alternative to religious segregation

Recently, Modern Orthodox Israeli leaders have been speaking up against the budding trend of Israeli integrative education (in Hebrew “Chinuch Meshalev”), referring to schools that bring together secular and religious Jewish children. In such schools a plurality of practices is encouraged: Religious students will open their day with morning prayers, others will do yoga instead. Many classes are shared, some are pursued separately. While acknowledging differences, Inter-group dialogue and friendship thrive, and tolerance becomes a reality.

However, as the first integrative schools are flourishing, some religious leaders are expressing opposition. In op-eds and interviews rabbis such as Yehuda Gilad, Yuval Sherlow and Meir Nehorai express fear that children who are exposed to the complexity of a joint religious and secular reality will end up confused and uncertain. They are concerned that children will understand that “everything goes” as Rav Sherlow put it. “Let us first provide students with a clear educational direction and later, when they mature, they will realize that the biggest challenge of Israeli society is to avoid building walls of separation between different factions, and to create a joint society” wrote Rav Nehorai (Makor Rishon, February 7, 2014).

I couldn’t agree more with his ultimate vision for Israeli society, but I believe the educational path he is prescribing is leading religious Zionism to perpetuate an educational tragedy, one which began decades ago when the secular and religious education systems parted ways. Segregated education leads to grievous outcomes for society and for individuals, as a host of educational studies on complex thinking, openness to others and multicultural education have shown.

The “let’s shield our kids from outside influences until they grow up” argument is based on an understandable desire to ensure that children internalize their group’s worldview, but it surrenders to the unjustified fear that exposing children to different cultural beliefs will lead to diffuse and uncommitted identities. This is based on the assumption that children cannot understand complexity and multiplicity. Let me point out two flaws in this line of thought: First, it is unproven. In fact, the opposite has been demonstrated time and again: In multicultural societies a secure identity involves exposure to others and an informed choice about one’s way of life. However, even if the segregation-commitment link were correct, the price paid for it would outweigh any possible gain.

Let us briefly consider the first part: Is it true that children cannot tolerate complexity? Well, not only do they deal with it on a daily basis when interacting with friends and foes, but they also internalize complex cultural messages, as any classic children’s book will prove (Try “Charlotte’s web” for a taste of it). And for Israeli children, in any case, complexity is only as far as the nearest news update. Moreover, recent research shows that children manage complex feats far earlier than we thought, with some studies showing that 4 month old babies can distinguish a cooperative person from an unhelpful one. If children have this capability, what might be the role of education? Rather than obfuscate reality, educators should mediate it: They should help transform the realization that “they are different” into a call for tolerance and inclusiveness.

Next, what are the prices of segregation? We can easily identify some of them if we turn to Haredi society, these days immersed in a painful internal struggle over separating Ashkenazi students from Sephardi ones in its own schools. Further, since religious Zionist individuals are eventually exposed to “otherness”, for males at the latest during military service (and probably part of the reason why Haredim are so vehemently opposed to their own recruitment), I would argue that the danger of an abrupt exposure in late adolescence is greater than experiencing variety early on and accepting it as a natural part of life. Studies show that 20-30% of Religious Zionist youth leave religion. Does this stem from an over-exposure to secularity? More likely it is the result of a sudden and unmediated exposure to it.

But let’s set practical implications aside and talk values; When did homogeneity become a religious value? The Almighty himself make the multi-hued rainbow the symbol of his covenant with humans! And what about the deeply religious value of free choice? How possible is choice in a society dictating a single way of life? I believe that separating religious and secular children is not only a bad tactic for religious communities but morally and religiously problematic, as well.

But the worst price paid for educational segregation is what we are seeing in Israel today: a society replete with bigotry and prejudice. Rav Nehorai hoped that walls which are built in childhood, can be conveniently toppled over when identity is crystalized. But children are wiser than we think. When adults sweet-talk about “tolerance” but exclude anyone different from their schools, children internalize the more powerful, implicit message: We don’t really want to hang out with them. Otherness is bad. Dozens of studies on Gordon Allport’s “Contact hypothesis” show that the best way to avoid prejudice is to make contact with the dreaded other, and research is clear about the timeframe for this to be effective: the earlier the better. Certainly, not any contact “works”, and for contact to lead to mutual respect, some rules must be followd: it must be ongoing; both sides need to be perceived as equal; there must be a chance to pursue shared goals and develop personal friendships, and each person in every group must count. All of these things happen in integrative schools, both of the Arab-Jewish and of the religious-secular varieties. Sadly, we have multiple studies showing that the highest rate of prejudice in Israel is expressed by religious youth, and it is consistently rising. I would venture an educated guess as to its cause: its leaders’ insistence on homogeneity and separation. Let’s give Israeli society a chance to overcome its internal factions and prejudices. Let’s give integrated education a chance to succeed.

(Dr. Nurit Novis Deutsch is involved in founding the first integrated school in the North of Israel for secular, traditional and religious students who will study jointly and engage in mutual dialogue, while empowering religious and secular identities. For more information or for those interested in supporting the venture, please contact Nurit at nurit.novis@gmail.com.)