My brother's thoughtful critique, for the most part didn't focus on curriculum, but on how open minded the presentation of the curriculum should be. Those are the kind of issues that I meant as being areas beyond talmud Torah.
Two of the curricular issues that he did raise were Jewish thought and tanach. Now, he must have meant tanach in boys' schools, since "yeshivish" girls' schools have very serious tanach study. For Jewish thought to be considered a high priority for a high school I would argue that it would need to be mandatory, rather than just an elective, and either offered for more than 1 year or given for as many periods during that 1 year as the "main" limudei kodesh subjects are. If there are schools whose Jewish thought classes meet that criteria, I would be thrilled to hear about it.
As for tanach in boys' schools, I am privileged to work in a separate boys' school with a group of extremely talented and serious tanach teachers. However, I think it is safe to say that in general, serious tanach study (beyond chumash, which you can find in "yeshivish" schools as well) is not a major priority of most of the Modern Orthodox boys' schools in America or, for that matter, in most of the men's yeshivot in Israel either.
I thought my brother raising tzeniut in girls' schools was unfair to "yeshivish" schools. There are more substantive "yeshivish" schools and ones that are less so, just as there are for Modern Orthodox schools. There is serious learning going on in the more substantive ones, not just constantly talking about tzneiut and, in any event, tzneiut is a modern orthodox value as well and ought to be discussed in an appropriate way.
Yaakov Blau
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/28/2016 09:45AM by mlb.
