For centuries, Chabad-Lubavitch has seen education as the most effective way to enhance the prospects of the future, both of the individual and of his and her community. The first Chabad-Lubavitch school was founded in 1775 in Eastern Europe, followed in 1776 by the establishment of an institute for advanced Judaic studies in Israel. In 1897 Chabad-Lubavitch founded its first yeshiva, or religious college, in order to incorporate its unique approach to spiritual and moral development into the general curriculum. In the early 1940s, when the devastation of the Holocaust brought Chabad-Lubavitch to reestablish itself in the United States, its educational network was established by the pioneering efforts of a handful of Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries, who went door-to-door offering parents the opportunity to provide their children with a Jewish education.

Today, over 200 Jewish day-and pre-schools are maintained by Chabad-Lubavitch in North America alone. In the 2002-03 school year more than 130,000 children were enrolled in Chabad-Lubavitch schools worldwide, more than half on scholarship grants. Often the school of choice for parents from coast to coast, Chabad-Lubavitch is constantly innovating new approaches to accommodate increasing enrollment, while maintaining an optimal teacher-student ratio.

Chabad-Lubavitch day schools aren’t limited to communities with large Jewish populations. There are day schools, after-school enrichment, Sunday schools and extended day care in Alaska, Beijing, Dimona, Baku and Tbilisi. In South Carolina, Chabad-Lubavitch is one of only nine local schools with NAEYC (National Association for the Education of Young Children) accreditation. Chabad-Lubavitch maintains Hebrew schools, yeshivas, libraries, vocational and post-graduate degree programs throughout the world, preferred by parents who choose to send their children to a safe environment where the integration of high quality academics and Jewish values comprise a wholesome education.

Chabad-Lubavitch schools bring out the best in each student by integrating a comprehensive Jewish studies curriculum with a superior secular education, and by approaching and understanding each student as an individual. More than 60% of the educators in the Chabad-Lubavitch school system are themselves graduates who continued their education in one of the many Chabad-Lubavitch graduate schools worldwide. The goal of Chabad-Lubavitch is to instill in all students age-old Jewish values and the academic and spiritual tools that will continue to guide them throughout their lives.

• In 1986, both Houses of the U.S. Congress unanimously passed a bill declaring the birthday of the Lubavitcher Rebbe “Education Day USA,” acknowledging the work of Chabad-Lubavitch in improving secular and religious education in the United States.

• Merkos L’inyonei Chinuch, the educational arm of the Lubavitch movement, is the only Jewish agency to grant accreditation to Jewish schools.

• Between 1997 and 2003 the U.S. Secretary of Education awarded three Chabad-Lubavitch schools the prestigious Blue Ribbon Award, honoring academic superiority and dramatic gains in student achievement.

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