A Cooperative Effort Between Formal and Informal Education Agencies

Abstract

There is a strong tendency in American Jewish education to promote the coordination of formal and informal Jewish education. This is not always possible for a variety of different reasons. One factor is the separate nature of the formal educational and informal educational organizations and their institutional goals and directions. Moreover, the formal educational agencies tend to hire staff that are not capable of dealing with informal education. They look at Jewish education as the transmission of cognitive skills; Jewish knowledge is viewed largely as a set of skills which demands long hours in classroom situations. On the other hand, informal educational institutions like the Jewish communal camps (in contrast to the ideological camps such as Camps Ramah, Morasha, Habonim Camps, Young Judea Camps, etc.) are generally social-work-oriented agencies. They do not always perceive themselves as the transmitters of Jewish culture nor as change agents in the complex process of Jewish identity. There is an uns...