(Courtesy of The Ramaz School) This year, the Ramaz Upper School introduced an innovative Israel education program, “Understanding Israel,” to ninth, 10th and 11th grade students. With “love and support for the State of Israel” as part of Ramaz’s mission, Israel education has always been woven into the Ramaz experience. However, based on feedback from parents, students, and alumni, the current hostile environment on college campuses throughout the country, and trends in education that place a focus on multiple narratives and perspectives in the study of history, it became clear that the school needed to critically examine its current Israel education programming and turn it into a more streamlined, formal curriculum.
The new Israel education curriculum is designed to prepare Ramaz students as the best-educated students in the country on the topic of Israel history and society. Based on current educational approaches on area studies, the curriculum design takes an interdisciplinary approach that combines history, politics, sociology, biblical studies, Jewish law and cultural studies to help students gain a well-rounded perspective on Israel and understand Israeli identity and society in complex and multifaceted ways. Ninth graders will focus on the State of Israel in a contemporary context—including its political structure and the idea of Jewish peoplehood. Tenth graders will delve into the history of the modern State of Israel and 11th graders will focus on the most contentious issues in Israeli society today.
The goal is for students to explore complex questions about Israel’s history, politics and society with an emphasis on diverse narratives so that students can develop a more nuanced understanding of Israeli history and culture. For example, students do not only learn that Israel is a Jewish and democratic state, but rather they also have numerous lessons in which they consider the tensions that arise between these two, at times, contending values. (e.g.,What is the role of Jewish Halacha in a Jewish and democratic state?)
The curriculum will foster not only a mature and deep love of Israel, it will reaffirm our students’ commitment to defend the State of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people and strongest ally of the United States in the Middle East. Over the course of the three-year sequence, Ramaz students will become increasingly prepared to engage confidently in dialogue about Israel, both within the Jewish community and on the world stage.
