As our programs at Mishkenot Ruth Daniel continue to grow, we have expanded our efforts for the greater Jaffa populace, and we recently embarked on an ambitious new endeavor:  The Daniel School at Weitzman Elementary, a struggling inner-city school in the heart of Jaffa.

The Weitzman School has traditionally served the impoverished Jewish population of Jaffa. However, in the past decade, Jaffa´s Arab population has also started sending their children to Weitzman despite it being officially designated by the municipality as a Jewish school.   This recent influx of Arab children to the school coupled with the existing challenges of a struggling population has intensified issues of religion, nationality, language, and identity, and it poses a multitude of problems for both the city and the school.  Even with a process of urban awakening, and a new affluent population that has moved into parts of Jaffa, the Weitzman School continues to drag behind.  The new stronger population sends their children elsewhere, and the remaining impoverished residents are left with the struggling Weitzman School.

Despite many efforts, the municipality of Tel Aviv declared that the school was to be closed for the 2009-2010 school year since only three Jewish children signed up for next year’s kindergarten.  As a last resort and counting on the Daniel centers’ successful experience in kindergartens, the city of Tel Aviv turned to us, and asked if we were willing to step in.

We felt that we could not turn away from a need so strongly expressed by so many. In early May 2009 we agreed to take upon ourselves this difficult task, and by mid May we had already achieved what seemed inconceivable just weeks before: over 30 children, mostly Jews but also Arabs, registered in Mishkenot Ruth for the Daniel Kindergarten to open at Weitzman.

Our program at Weitzman aims to use the multicultural nature of the school to strengthen the individual identities of each of our students while pushing the ideas of pluralism and cooperation at an early age.   Our Univesral Holidays program, for example, chooses several international holidays like Child’s Day, Earth Day, etc., and the children and their families come together to celebrate.  By exploring themes such as religious and cultural pluralism, tolerance, and equality, and through involving the parents in variety of community events throughout the year the Daniel Elementary school offers a unique opportunity for dialogue as well as grassroots community development. The kindergarten works to build a community out of this fragmented neighborhood of rich and poor, Arabs and Jews, old residents and new, and   finally, to provide the best possible education for these children who do not enjoy the same opportunities other Israelis have in their hometowns.

As a result of our successful first year, we are opening two new kindergarten classes in the coming September, and this year’s graduates will move up to an all new Daniel Centers 1^st grade class.  We will continue implementing our program and curriculum through all the grades in the school adding one grade per year.

Never before has the Reform Movement engaged itself with populations outside its immediate influence who so badly need our support, and as this program comes into fruition and grows into a school, we hope to incorporate the Daniel Center´s innovative model into the curriculums of other mixed cities in Israel.