Project Education

on at Jewish day schools and the recession created a crisis: tuition costs have outstripped the ability of many families to pay. A decade ago, roughly one third of all community children received some sort of tuition assistance. When the economy tanked a few years ago, that number rose to 48 percent. Today, nearly 1 out of every two children in the community receives tuition assistance in some form. To develop strategies on how to address tuition affordability, the Orthodox Union and UJA Federation of NY partnered with Project Education to look at the issue of Tuition Affordability in our community. In 2014, eight focus groups were held and a community wide survey yielded nearly 1000 responses, clearly hitting a nerve. Almost all the respondents indicated that a yeshivah education was essential for teaching Jewish rituals, values and culture, for keeping their children in the community, as well as excellence in secular studies. 72% of respondents said that they were most concerned about affordability, the financial strain it was putting on their families. Project Education 2.0 is a 501C3 nonprofit aimed at addressing day school tuition affordability. Project Education was founded in 2011. In 2021, the infrastructure of Project Education was turned over to a new team with a new idea, and a new chapter of the organization was formed. What challenge are we addressing? Low-income families sending their children to day school in Brooklyn receive support from their school, through substantial tuition assistance, and from various community institutions, through financial aid. High-income families are able to afford their children’s tuition without assistance. However, middle-income families are caught in the vise of earning too much for traditional assistance while having to make significant sacrifices to pay for their children’s Jewish education. Given the high cost of living and high cost of living Jewishly (school, camp, synagogue), we estimate that families in this range are struggling, yet they are not eligible for tuition assistance. Project Education 2.0 is focused on these "middle-income" families.