Jonathan Mirvis is a senior lecturer at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is the Hebrew University's leading academic specialist in Social Entrepreneurship and Social Innovation, one of the courses offered by the Melton Master's.
Jonathan recently published a book "It's Our Challenge: A Social Entrepreneurship Approach to Jewish Education." With the intention of going deeper and learning more about some of his ideas, we interviewed him.
Why did you decide to direct your career towards Jewish education? What is it you like the most about it?
I feel that Jewish education is an important component within the Jewish people and we have received a wonderful gift which is to be born into it. One of the questions we must ask ourselves is what are we going to do to ensure that the next generations continue to be part of the Jewish people. This is a very important matter because a century ago we were Jewssh because we were born Jews to Jewish parents.
Nowadays, I believe that every Jew is one by choice. Every Jew basically chooses his future and lifestyle. That is why the big question we have today is will our children and grandchildren choose a Jewish future and do not cut their connections with their Jewish past.
Thus as Jewish educators we need to provide them with a deep understanding of Judaism, our history and our culture that will enable them to choose a Jewish future.
We know that in various parts of the world there is a crisis regarding Jewish education. While reading your book, I made a lot of sense to an idea you mention about how families no longer prefer to spend their money on Jewish schools, or that Jewish education is not a priority. And one of the questions that caught my attention was "How do we design educational formats that offer high impact and that are accessible and attractive to those who are indifferent?". Based on your experience and all the cases you know of in the world that were able to respond to this problem, what do you think is the key to innovate in Jewish education, taking this challenge into account?
Our great challenge today is that most of our students are not involved in Jewish education. I mean we don't have customers. We would love to have customers, but we don't.
In my book I talk about the 4Ps that impact education: participants, personnel, pennies, and products. We need products with a good impact. If you ask me how to do it, I can't invent all four P’s. Then the question would become what do you have. You always start with what you have, you can't start with what you don't have. If you have staff, we must ask how to get the others. If you have the funding, how do you purchase the rest? In other words one’s starting point will always be the “P” that is at hand .
Do you think that the crisis that exists today with Jewish education is related to the approach, the methodologies, or with how it is thought that it should be? Is there something that we should modify in practice and we are not doing it?
The situation in each country is different. For example, in England, finances are less of an issue since the state may fund Jewish day schools.
In the United States, where there is a separation of church and state, there is no state funding at all for Jewish education. I don't know what happens in other countries including Argentina,
If we go to the basics, and that is what the book really tries to do, in the Jewish world today there is a difference between what I call customers and consumers, and those who are non-customers. Customers and consumers are those who are willing to pay for Jewish education with the vast majority being among the Orthodox. In other words, if you choose to live in a place that has Jewish education it is because you are a customer. Regretfully the majority of the Jewish people in the Diaspora are non-customers of quality Jewish education. They may be clients of the Jewish rituals, or of the festivities, however they have to be enticed to Jewish education. As such, an important focus of the book is how we communicate with the non-customers.
One of the most important chapters relating to this is Jobs to be done, that claims that we must go where the students want to go.
This concept developed by Harvard Professor Clayton Christensen is a must for every Jewish educator. The most important thing is to try to understand what people are trying to do and seek to help them achieve it.
When young people who are going to high school are looking to have a great school so they can get into college, if we have Jewish high schools that offer that, then they will come to Jewish schools. That happens in Australia: they have a large Jewish population in Jewish secondary schools, in fact, the one of the best is the one with very little religious education. Many parents choose the Jewish Day Schools because of their academic excellence.
In other words, give people what they want!
In youth movements and other non-formal education spaces, adolescents want good social experiences. Make sure they have the best social experience they can possibly have. They will the go to the Jewish activities, not because they are Jewish, but because they have what they want.
What happens with Hebrew, which is often difficult to incorporate into school schedules, especially considering this idea where perhaps it is not what students choose today? Added to the lack of teachers that exists.
Who says that Hebrew must be taught by teachers? One of the most important issues today is that to access knowledge, you do not need the educational system. You can get everything in videos, on the internet, on TV.
A crazy out of the box idea: what if we have a system where we have kids from Israel and students from Latin or North America talking about soccer together in Hebrew on a regular basis via Zoom? Those from Israel could visit their zoom friends from the Americas and those from the Americas could visit their Israeli counterparts Children want to meet other children, they want to travel. The interaction could be facilitated by teachers yet one even may get by with the few quality Hebrew teachers present in the system. Let kids talk about football, no one says that you have to talk about Israel! Let's kids talk about pop stars in Hebrew. In other words, let's kids talk about subjects of their interest. Given the complex challenges we have to think “outside the box”, we have to think about where the children are and how we can do what we can with the resources we have.
I don't have the answers, but I believe that being an educator today is much more than just teaching. That is what the Melton innovation program seeks to do. It seeks to tell you: "Education is far more complex than you think. You have to think big."
We are in a competitive world. We compete for children's time and attention. Even with those children who attend school, who says they are learning? They may be thinking about Messi when we are really discussing Moshe. The fact that a teacher is speaking does not mean that they are listening; we are competing for their attention.
As a professor of the Master's in Jewish Education, what do you think is the differential value that it offers taking into account these ideas that we were talking about? I am referring to the entrepreneurship and innovation track.
This track combines theory and practice and helps meet the challenges I raised. We have an introductory course, the one I teach, which is based on the book. We have a course on thinking out the box to stimulate our ideas. In addition there is a course in evaluation to ensure we are on track and to ensure our ideas are sustainable we have a course in fundraising. That is the first step. But how do we make our innovations possible? You must learn how to raise funds. So we have a course in fundraising. Students then enter an advanced course that helps them develop a project. Finally, students participate in an “Accelerator” facilitated by Hebrew University’s HU Innovate that enables students to take their project forward with the nuts and bolts of implementation.
HU innovate was developed originally to promote commercial entrepreneurship and innovation.
Here at the university it already existed on issues related to commerce. Two years ago Melton partnered with HU Innovate to offer the first accelerator for social issues with our piloting of the entrepreneurship and innovation track the track in Jewish education in our regularMA program. With our launching of this track in the International program, we will be offering you insights that will enable you to influence the future of your community. If you believe you can be a catalyst for change , we will help you make it happen. We are not going to do it, we are going to teach you how to do it.
Anything else you would like to add?
I believe that anyone who is involved in Jewish education is involved in one of the most important professions we have today. We all need to look at ourselves in the mirror and ask “what are you doing in this world?” As Jewish educators, you can proudly claim That you are strengthening the chain of Jewish continuity, influencing future generations. It's a big thing!
I am looking forward to seeing you in my course as a participant of the Melton Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation track.
To learn more about Mirvis's ideas, presented in his book, you can access his YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@jonathanmirvis5691
Jonatan Mirvis will be giving a talk on the topics presented in his book on March 16 at 7:30 p.m. Israel time. You can access by clicking here.