Eli Spitzer on the New York Times’s Controversial Yeshiva Report

This month, the New York Times published a lengthy investigation into New York state’s funding of ḥasidic yeshivas and the secular education, or lack thereof, those schools provide. The front-page report, “In Hasidic Enclaves, Failing Private Schools Flush With Public Money,” claimed that the state has given one billion dollars over the last four years to ḥasidic yeshivas, which in turn have failed to provide the education in secular subjects like math and reading that the state demands. The story has attracted major attention and elicited outrage: outrage from taxpayers who feel taken advantage of, from ḥasidic families who feel misunderstood, from readers who pity the students that the Times portrays, and from Jewish communal leaders who see in this front-page exposé an attempt to target their schools, teachers, and families.