Jewish People's and Peretz Schools

On 20 October 1910, the Fifth Poale Zion Convention held in Montreal passed Chaim Zhitlowsky's resolution for the establishment of a secular Yiddish-based school system across North America to transmit the movement's core Zionist and socialist ideals.{{r|roskies}} A supplementary school called the National Radical School was established in 1913 in Montreal's Jewish immigrant quarter of the Mile End, meant as a secular alternative to the traditional synagogue schools of the 1870–1910s and the Talmud Torah system.{{r|pinsky2}} The school expanded to over two hundred students by 1914. The school was not officially tied to the Poale Zion party, and by 1914 the party had lost control of the school to the Jewish Labour Bundist genosen.{{cite book|last=Srebrnik|first=Henry Felix|title=Creating the Chupah: The Zionist Movement and the Drive for Jewish Communal Unity in Canada, 1898-1921|publisher=Academic Studies Press|location=Boston|year=2011|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T8qBZwEACAAJ|isbn=978-1-936235-71-1}}

In 1918, the National Radical School was renamed the Jewish Peretz Schools ({{Langx|yi|ײִדישע פרץ שולן}}, Yiddishe Peretz Shuln) after writer I. L. Peretz, and purchased its first building on Cadieux Street near Prince Arthur Street.{{r|pinsky1}} The secular Jewish curriculum was centred on the Yiddish language and literature, as well as on Jewish history and folklore.{{r|margolis}} Principals and teachers invited international Yiddish figures into the classroom; guests of the Peretz Schools during the 1920s and 1930s included Aaron Glants-Leyeles, Sholem Asch, Peretz Hirschbein, David Pinski, Shmuel Niger, and Chaim Zhitlowsky.{{r|margolis|page=144}} By the mid-twenties, both Hebrew and the study of Jewish tradition were introduced into the Peretz Schools' curriculum.{{r|margolis}}

Moving to a renovated factory on Duluth Street, the school added a kindergarten in 1941, and established a full-day school in 1942. The school remained on Duluth until 1960 when it moved to Wavell Road in Côte Saint-Luc following the westward migration of the Jewish community.{{r|pinsky2}}

File:Segal-JPS.jpg with afternoon school class of Jewish People's School, {{circa|1918}}.]]

The emphasis on Yiddish over Hebrew at the National Radical School was hotly debated, and a group of dissident activists emerged.{{r|margolis}} In 1914, a group of educators led by Dr. Yehuda Kaufman, Moshe Dickstein and Abraham Parnass, broke away from the National Radical School to establish the independent Jewish People's Schools ({{Langx|yi|ײִדישע פאָלקס שולן}}, Yidishe Folks Shuln; {{Langx|he|בתי ספר עממיים יהודיים}}).{{cite journal|title=The Canadian Years of Yehuda Kaufman (Even Shmuel): Educator, Journalist, and Intellectual|first=Ira|last=Robinson|journal=Canadian Jewish Studies|volume=15|year=2008|url=https://cjs.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/cjs/article/view/22612}} Classes initially took place in a house, with volunteers as teachers.{{cite web|title=History|url=https://jppsbialik.ca/en/jpps/about/history/|website=Jewish People's and Peretz Schools|access-date=11 November 2018}} The new school emphasized the equal importance of Hebrew and Yiddish in Jewish life, and placed greater emphasis on Jewish tradition than did the National Radical School.{{cite journal|first=Shlomoh|last=Wiseman|year=1948|title=The Jewish People's School of Montreal|journal=Jewish Education|volume=20|issue=1|pages=58–63|doi=10.1080/1524-414891824476|issn=0021-6429}} The school would eventually settle on St. Urbain Street near St. Cuthbert Street in 1920, staying there until 1952. A second building (designed by architect Maxwell M. Kalman) opened in 1926 on the corner of Waverly and Fairmount, remaining there until 1963.{{r|pinsky1}}

In 1927, the Jewish People's Schools established itself as an all-day Jewish school, the first in Montreal since the synagogue schools of the 1880s–1900s.{{r|pinsky1}} The school taught public school curricula along with Jewish education, history, and literature, Hebrew and Yiddish, and the ideology of the Labour Zionist movement, at the cost of ten cents per week.{{r|read}} As the Jewish community migrated westward, a new branch was built at Van Horne Avenue and Westbury Avenue in 1956.{{r|pinsky1}} While the Jewish People's Schools moved in the direction of Outremont's middle-class element, the Peretz Schools continued to serve more of the working class elements of the Jewish community.{{r|august}}

Except for the Peretz Schools' continued stress of Yiddish over Hebrew, by the 1920s the overall philosophy, educational objectives and pedagogical approaches of the Peretz and Jewish People's Schools were essentially the same.{{cite web|url=http://jpps.ca/aboutpages/jppshistory.htm|title=Our History|date=2003|website=Jewish People's and Peretz Schools|access-date=11 November 2018|archive-date=19 January 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080119025108/http://jpps.ca/aboutpages/jppshistory.htm|url-status=dead}} Still, despite the efforts that were made to reunite the schools beginning in the 1920s, ideological differences prevented the Peretz and Jewish People's Schools from merging for half a century.{{r|august}} In 1971, financial necessity (as well as the retirement of their two long-term principals) led to the merger of the Jewish People's School and the Peretz Schools.{{r|margolis|page=135}} The unified educational system created Bialik High School a year later, offering a comprehensive curriculum of both secular and Jewish education for secondary students.{{r|pinsky1}}

In 2003, the elementary school's Wavell and Van Horne branches were consolidated and the Wavell location sold.{{cite news|title=Jewish School to Close Côte St. Luc Campus|newspaper=The Gazette|date=2 November 2003|page=A4}} A merger of JPPS–Bialik schools with UTT–Herzliah was announced in February 2011, but was soon rejected.{{cite news|title=Jewish day school systems scrap merger plan|first=Brenda|last=Branswell|newspaper=The Montreal Gazette|location=Montreal|access-date=12 November 2018|date=11 November 2011|page=A4|url=https://montrealgazette.com/news/Jewishschoolsystemsscrapmergerplan/5694150/story.html|url-status=}}{{deadlink|date=September 2023}} In 2016, JPPS–Bialik announced the sale of its elementary school building on Van Horne Avenue to the Donald Berman Yaldei Developmental Center. The decision was made in response to declining enrollment, prompting the relocation of elementary students to the Bialik High School campus in Côte Saint-Luc. Before the winter break of that year, students packed the contents of their desks into boxes. Upon returning in the new year, they unpacked their belongings at their new campus. {{cite news|title=Montreal's religious and ethnic schools reposition to stay relevant|url=https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/montreals-jewish-and-ethnic-schools-reposition-to-stay-relevant|first=Katherine|last=Wilton|newspaper=The Montreal Gazette|date=2 November 2016|access-date=11 November 2018}}

{{Unreferenced section|date=February 2025}}

On March 13, 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Government of Quebec ordered all schools in the province, including JPPS–Bialik, to close for 14 days as a precautionary measure. The school administration closely monitored the public health situation in coordination with Federation CJA, MEES, and other Jewish day schools. As per the province's directive, all in-person classes and scheduled programs at JPPS–Bialik were suspended effective immediately. The initial closure was set until March 27, 2020, but was later extended. To mitigate disruptions to learning, Bialik High School students transitioned to online classes beginning March 17, 2020.

In August 2020, JPPS–Bialik introduced a hybrid learning model, combining in-person and online instruction. The school also implemented class bubbles, limiting interactions between student groups to reduce potential COVID-19 transmission. By August 2021, JPPS–Bialik had returned to full-time in-person learning and discontinued the use of class bubbles, aligning with updated provincial public health guidelines.

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• David Botwinik (1920–2022), composer{{cite news|first=Mike|last=Cohen|newspaper=The Jewish Tribune|date=2 June 2011|location=Montreal|url=http://botwinikmusic.com/old/Jewish%20Tribune-article-6-2-2011.pdf|title=Retired music teacher Botwinik to have Yiddish concert in his honour}}
• Jamie Elman (1976– ), actor{{cite news|url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/jewish-montrealers-use-yiddish-for-new-web-series-1.2771731|title=Jewish Montrealers use Yiddish for new web series|first=Jeanette|last=Kelly|newspaper=CBC News|date=19 September 2014|access-date=12 November 2018}}
• Mitch Garber (1964– ), business executive{{cite news|title=Mitch Garber holds court in Vegas North|first=Mike|last=Cohen|page=4|newspaper=The Suburban|date=18 March 2015|url=https://www.mikecohen.ca/files/profile-on-caesars-boss-mitch-garber.pdf|access-date=12 November 2018}}
• Gilah Yelin Hirsch (1944– ), artist{{cite journal|page=106|title=Torah Study, Feminism and Spiritual Quest in the Work of Five American Jewish Women Artists|first=Gloria Feman|last=Orenstein|author-link=Gloria Feman Orenstein|journal=Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues|volume=14|date=Fall 2007|issue=14|doi=10.2979/nas.2007.-.14.97|s2cid=162274882}}
• Kelly Kruger (1982– ), actress
• Alison Levine (1990– ), boccia player
• Jonathan Mann (1960– ), journalist
• Sarah Mlynowski (1977– ), author{{cite news|first=Jennifer M.|last=Macleod|newspaper=The Canadian Jewish News|date=14 February 2008|url=http://www.cjnews.com/culture/books-and-authors/bewitching-new-fiction-former-montrealer|title=Bewitching new fiction from former Montrealer|access-date=12 November 2018}}
• J. I. Segal (1896–1954), Yiddish poet and journalist{{r|zipper}}
• Yechiel Shainblum, painter and sculptor{{cite book|page=356|title=Journals of Yaakov Zipper, 1950-1982: The Struggle for Yiddishkeit|first=Yaakov|last=Zipper|editor1-first=Mervin|editor1-last=Butovsky|editor2-first=Ode|editor2-last=Garfinkle|publisher=McGill-Queen's University Press|location=Montreal|isbn=978-0-7735-2627-3|year=2004|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ey3wtvKzLqYC}}
• Shulamis Yelin (1913–2002), writer and educator{{cite web|title=Shulamis Yelin|website=Jewish Women's Archive|first=Tamara|last=Cohen|access-date=12 November 2018|url=https://jwa.org/weremember/yelin-shulamis}}

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{{Reflist|refs={{cite journal|first=Anne|last=Read|year=2018|title=The Precarious History of Jewish Education in Quebec|journal=Religion & Education|volume=45|issue=1|pages=23–51|doi=10.1080/15507394.2017.1367595|s2cid=148843756}}

{{cite book|title=Jewish Roots, Canadian Soil: Yiddish Cultural Life in Montreal, 1905-1945|first=Rebecca|last=Margolis|publisher=McGill-Queen's University Press|location=Montreal|year=2011|isbn=978-0-7735-3812-2|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FlmLEi6Y3FMC}}

{{cite book|first=David G.|last=Roskies|author-link=David G. Roskies|chapter=Yiddish in Montreal: The Utopian Experiment|editor1-first=Ira|editor1-last=Robinson|editor2-first=Pierre|editor2-last=Anctil|editor2-link=Pierre Anctil|editor3-first=Mervin|editor3-last=Butovsky|title=An Everyday Miracle: Yiddish Culture in Montreal|location=Toronto|publisher=Véhicule Press|year=1990|pages=22–38|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NI0lAAAAMAAJ|isbn=978-1550650099}}

{{cite web|url=http://imjm.ca/location/1202|title=Jewish People's School (Yidishe Folks Shule)|website=Museum of Jewish Montreal|first=Marian|last=Pinsky|access-date=11 November 2018}}

{{cite web|url=http://imjm.ca/location/1202|title=National Radical School - Peretz Shule|website=Museum of Jewish Montreal|first=Marian|last=Pinsky|access-date=11 November 2018}}

{{cite thesis|last=August|first=David|date=June 1975|title=The genesis period of the Jewish People's School in Montreal|type=Thesis|publisher=Concordia University|url=https://spectrum.library.concordia.ca/5127/}}}}

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Category:1913 establishments in Quebec

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Category:Elementary schools in Montreal

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Category:International Baccalaureate schools in Quebec

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Category:Jews and Judaism in Montreal

Category:Labor Zionism

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