by Dr. Lynne Koral
I went to public school in Queens, N.Y. There were some other Jewish students, but I got teased because we were not Orthodox and did not do what others who were not Jewish thought we should do. I even wrote a poem about it. The first verse went something like this:
Your soul is as dark as coal,
I hear them say,
Don’t you want to save it?
Pray, pray, pray!
Because we were not religious, people who were not Jewish did not think I was observing such traditions as fasting for the High Holy Days or that I might be sinful. I did not know very much about the holidays, but it was mostly over politics for which people called me names, such as being against the Vietnam War.
As a child, I did not identify anti-Semitic slurs. I don’t think we learned about the Holocaust — at least not that I can remember. It was especially during elementary school, which consisted predominantly of white students, except for one African-American girl, that I don’t remember any Jewish content being taught. One of the things that is still true is that the Jewish Holocaust is not studied. My parents did get me books in braille about Jewish themes from the Jewish Braille Institute.
As a Jewish person, I am sure that my experiences in educational attainment were not as severe as my other brothers and sisters who are of a diverse background. We must all learn about each other and respect each other and live in integrated places and integrated schools instead of segregated de facto ones like I attended. Most of us learn at home about our culture or faith, but most people do not understand that Judaism is a culture, and not just a practice.