Keywords
education law; religion law; Haredi yeshiva; New York; compulsory education
Abstract
This Note explains recent findings that many of New York’s Haredi yeshivas are failing to comply with the compulsory education laws and advocacy for the state to heighten enforcement. It examines other community members’ opposition to this belief and numerous legal challenges. This Note advances legal scholarship by pointing out that although these debates regarding education and religious freedom are important, in the context of New York’s Haredi yeshivas, they are futile without also recognizing that New York’s statute does not provide for efficient means of enforcement. There is little to no existing literature on this specific issue. Thus, this Note aims to bring awareness to this deficiency by demonstrating how fining or imprisoning yeshiva parents is inappropriate, withholding funds to entire districts is impractical, and how a part-time homeschooling plan, as suggested by a state supreme court justice, would be ineffective. Instead, it proposes that the state and local education departments should be permitted to withhold funding from individual noncomplying schools.
Recommended Citation
Kaitlyn Sivertsen,
Compelling Compliance: An Analysis of Methods for Enforcing New York’s Compulsory Education Law as Applied to Haredi Yeshivas,
93 Fordham L. Rev. 1071
(2024).
Available at: https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/flr/vol93/iss3/7