Europe: Something from (Almost) Nothing – The Challenges of Education in European Communities – A Personal Perspective

Abstract

This chapter takes as its basis the experience of the author, an English-born Jewish educator working in Israel for the last 25 years, who has started to work extensively in Central and East Central Europe over the last few years. It attempts to suggest a number of issues that seem relevant to those who would try and understand the reality of Jewish life in these old-new areas and to present a series of questions and dilemmas which Jewish educators would do well to think about. It is the claim here that the issues that come out of an examination with this relatively unfamiliar reality are sufficiently weighty to be addressed by the whole educational community in the Jewish world.