There is ongoing debate in the Jewish community about how to best educate our kids; that debate has been discussed here repeatedly.  Congregational schools, today largely the purview of Reform and Conservative congregations, are repeatedly being pummeled as failed institutions of learning to be supplemented or even replaced by camping, day schools, private tutors and other options.  New data recently released by the S3K Synagogue Studies Institute indicates that the problems with congregational schools are symptomatic of problems with the congregations themselves, and the school problems cannot be remedied apart from the larger issues.  

The report from S3K, entitled Reform and Conservative Congregations: Different Strengths, Different Challenges, collected data from 1,215 congregations.  In brief, the data shows "the Conservative movement is struggling, with smaller congregations in older suburbs, fewer innovations in service styles, ambivalence about the need to change, and strained financial resources. Reform congregations, by contrast are larger, more geographically dispersed, offer a more diverse set of programs and enjoy higher morale. Both Jewish movements suffer from lackluster attendance and pallid attempts at recruitment of new members."

Demographic data shows that only 8% of the congregational membership of the surveyed synagogues was between the ages of 18 and 34.  By contrast, 24% of the membership was over the age of 65.   This is attributed to two over-arching factors: Jews marry and raise kids at an older age, but also congregations tend to gear their programming towards an older demographic with little overall expertise in meeting the spiritual and social needs of those who are single and/or childless.  Both denominations showed poor track records with congregational welcoming to newcomers with roughly only 1/3 of respondents indicating any follow-up communication with visitors.  

The study discusses other issues as well including the fact that the recession impacted the fiscal health of both congregants and congregations.  30% of respondents reported laying off staff while 60% cut or froze staff salaries.  Interestingly, Reform congregations tend to be more staff-heavy so they suffered more cuts but they are also larger overall in membership so they reported less fiscal struggle than Conservative respondents  

The study doesn't directly discuss congregational education but it is not a stretch to understand the impact this reality has on congregational schools.

1. Congregational schools are the most staff-intensive component of a synagogue other than perhaps an early childhood program.  They are also loss-leaders for most congregations.  Hence, they are natural targets for budget reduction either among the teachers or the director.  There has been a trend of downsizing education positions to "administrators" and ceding the content direction to rabbinic staff with the new title of "Director of Life-Long Learning" or some similar permutation.  The assumption is that the rabbi can do what the educator can do, but in truth education is a dedicated skill set separate from content knowledge.  The result is less positive direction for the school either way, an overburdened rabbi, and dissatisfied congregational families who are not finding fulfillment in other congregational programs.  
2. People today seek personal relationships for themselves and their children that are meaningful.  If the school is not providing that to their children as well as content delivery, the family will find little value in attendance.  Simply put, people today want relationships. According to S3K's Rabbi Larry Hoffman, “Synagogues became programmatic centers in an era before the internet and two-career families. People were attracted to vibrant centers with lots of activity. Now people are too busy for that. Programming without a deeper sense of spiritual purpose just asks busy people to sign on to becoming busier – an unlikely prospect these days.” The same can be said for sending their children to congregational schools.  
3. Synagogues need to innovate.  Rabbi Hoffman says,“non-intentional synagogues will probably survive as what they are – they actually do many things very well (life-cycle ceremonies, for example); but they will increasingly face competition from freelancers willing to do the same things for less; and they will constantly face budgetary issues and the challenge of increasingly large percentages of members who belong nominally, who come on occasion, but whose energy and passion lie elsewhere.”  Adds Dr. Ron Wolfson of S3K, “We have to move from a synagogue of programs targeting different populations to a deepening relationship between the synagogue and their members. The best way to root people in the life of the congregation is through relationships. If we don’t, people will drop their memberships, and that’s a big problem.”  Congregational schools are by and large treated as population-specific programs and not relationship centers; we continue them in that vein at our own peril.

Pittsburgh, like most Jewish communities, struggles with its congregational schools and is trying different ideas to reinvigorate them, but there is little conversation about them as relationship centers.  We still address them as program centers and the data tells us that is not sustainable as a format.  At the same time, they have to deliver quality educational content.  The challenge is how to meet the changing culture's needs while sustaining the eternal teachings of our people.  The conversation continues....