n a speech delivered at the Agudah Midwest Convention in Chicago, HaRav Shmuel Fuerst, Dayan of Agudath Israel of Illinois, called out seminaries for charging exorbitant tuition, thereby placing unbearable strains on frum families.
“The cost today [for girl’s seminaries] is about $25,000 to $30,000. Now with the weakening dollar, they have an excuse to hike it even more,” Rabbi Fuerst said.
Rabbi Fuerst called for not-for-profit seminaries to be opened in Chicago so that relief could be provided to families crushed by high seminary tuition and resultant debt.
“It’s time we stop the seminaries in Eretz Yisroel [from taking] advantage of us,” Rabbi Feurst said. “Many of our families sent to Eretz Yisroel and paid $30,000 because they have no breira – they have no choice.”
“And these $30,000 is $30,000 that many families don’t have. We must stop it. And if we do it here in Chicago, I guarantee you that different parts of the country will follow us.”
maybe we should also put a stop to high chalav israel and glatt prices, and high housing and rent in frum neighborhoods and tesla cars etc'
ReplyDeleteno one is forcing to pay this tuition and the seminaries will charge whatever the parents are willing to pay. it's a business and has nothing to do with chinuch.
There's no mitzvah to send girls to E"Y for Seminary.
ReplyDeleteFuerst had the right message this time, but is the wrong messenger.
ReplyDeleteHe's another shvantz in the pay for play mamzerus schemes along with the Philly Kaminetzkys & Nota Greenblatt.
The only question is what took the rabbinical establishment so long to come up with the obvious: If you don't have the funds, you stay home. In the Alte Heim they used to say "Oreme Menschen kochen mit Wasser".
ReplyDeleteYou are a Hedonist and worrying about mamzerim ? What's the story with the mamzeres schemes. This is the fuerst I hear about it.
ReplyDeleteThe title is meant to mock Fuerst & his clients.
ReplyDeleteThe late av beis din of cRc Chicago, Gedalya Schwartz, is also guilty of pay for play mamzerus, not just Chief Agudah Fresser of Chicago Shmuel Fuerst.
Because Sholom Kaminetzky on behalf of his old crackpot father was shopping around for a posek to whitewash the mamzerim from hazoyna Tamar Epstein-Friedman, rabbonim started investigating how many culprits are involved in such rackets. Much of the information was posted on the blogs of the rabbi Eidensohn brothers of Israel & Monsey.
Rabbi Korobkin in a suburb north of Toronto, who considers himself a talmid of Schwartz, was also caught conducting the fake "annulments" of marriages. He was threatened with cherem by rabbonei Toronto if there is one more episode. In a sad twist of irony, Korobkin was the replacment rabbi for Baruch Taub, who was thrown out for an adulterous affair with the wife of a member of that shul. The affair & expulsion were written about by a newspaper columnist. But the Board of the Canadian Jewish News newspaper, who include Taub associates, did not allow Taub to be named in the article. Taub was also one of the executives in OU-NCSY during the Lanner molestation cover up. And Taub was harboring fugitive pedophile Amram Bendahan for years, even lying to the FBI that Bendahan had "died".