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No, and here’s why. Office pranks are not like schoolboy pranks. You do not have a personal relationship with your coworkers that you can take advantage of; you only have a business one. Professionalism dictates a code of conduct. If any of my subs created a serious prank, I would give a warning and send them to HR for a refresher course on office conduct. A second offense would result in some type of disciplinary action.
Your specific prank shakes your manager’s ability to rely on you and she will be embarrassed when she finds out that the replacements were not necessary.
My sons are 2 and 8 months LOL
I apologize in advance, but I can’t resist.
Boy your kids are close in age. Only 6 months apart!
YW Moderator-80
Moderator
That would be: “little” minds.
You implicate yourself with that correction, but I refuse to accept the implication as truth 🙂
Mod80-
That would be a foolish consistency (albeit accidental as well). We all know that to be the hobgoblin of small minds and well, not our Pepper.
SJS, I didn’t know you knit! Can I put in a request? Please?
qa,
Yes, if paying high salaries causes a tuition crisis then something has to give. But if I am to understand that the average Rebbi salary is 50K or less (and that a Rebbi is higher paid than the secular educators) and there is still a cash crunch, how is that possible? If there are 30 kids per class, $1700 each pays the Rebbi.
I am also a bit skeptical because as others pointed out, there seems to be no incentive for people with families to give up government benefits for a salary that is less than at least 60K. So why would anyone take a job as a Rebbi?
Are we kidding here? An average Rebbi in grades 1-12 is getting $50K or less???
Either you meant a trip to Baltimore, or you meant the Constitution. And neither one is a freighter 🙂
Reminds me of an old friend who failed the citizenship test because when the judge asked what the Constitution is, he replied “A boat”.
hereorthere
Member
Why does someone get to “have the last word” and then get to decide the topic should closed after they get the last word and now no one can respond even if they say something erronious?
42.
hello99-
As you say, the heter is no longer relevant today. But I can give you plenty of counter-examples where an issur is no longer relevant today, or a gezeira is no longer relevant today. Would you apply your logic to that as well?
Let’s try to analyze this logically. What is the impetus for the stringent requirements of tsnius? In a world with no men (or a women’s locker room for the sake of a realistic example) is there a different standard? If you answer yes, that means at least some of the requirements of tsnius are to avoid provoking men. If you answer no, please explain the double standard.
I see at least two schools of thought emerging here. One appears to be an expression of outrage against men, decrying the need for women to act/dress differently than they would otherwise have to, merely due to problems that men have. If it is men that have the problem, then men should be the ones who have to fix it, not women. I personally find this way of thinking to be quite appalling.
Another school of thought is that the same Creator who gave women physical (and other) characteristics that are attractive to men, and the ability to ensnare men, also commanded them to make use of an appropriate “bottle stopper” to keep their powers in check. With great power comes great responsibility (as my wise uncle used to say). A similar example is tzedaka – a wealthy person has (financial) powers and the same Creator Who gave him those powers commands him what to do with them to alleviate the weakness of others (who lack the means to live at a proper standard). In the past it may have been more obvious where to draw the line in behavior and dress (“V’hatznea leches im H”E”, “B’chol drachecha do’ehu”), but it is very clear that in today’s world, clothing designers are purposely seeking to be on the wrong side of that line (most designers are men, after all) and they are affecting everyone’s judgement.
To some degree, black and white rules are needed now, in face of the anarchy found in the world of fashion. And to some degree, men may be needed to participate in setting these rules (due to halacha and mesorah passing from man to man, and the degree that the requirements are for his benefit), albeit the participation should be INDIRECTLY. [In my opinion, men have participated thus far as much as will ever be needed and the future can be left to capable women.] I tend to agree with SJS and the others who have stated that the approach to teaching tsnius requirements taken thus far may have been flawed and an improved approach must be implemented.
I think it should be obvious that any man who ever leaves his home is going to be challenged in this regard whether or not every Bas Yisroel is 100% up to the standard or not, simply due to other people in this world. If I have an urge to steal, there will be some stores that have cameras to prevent me and some that have none, and regarding those stores it is entirely up to me to prevent myself. So, in my opinion the men’s job here is DONE (except for giving encouragement to wives and daughters). Women should take responsibility for themselves, and men should take responsibility for themselves. “Kiruv rechokim” should be left to women.
feivel,
I disagree with your statement that gedolim do not make claims about their abilities. The Talmud and sifrei Kabbala are rife with examples of such claims. In regard to any gedolim who have not made such claims, why would you lay claim to and attribute supernatural powers to these gedolim if they do not themselves claim to possess any -simply because their stature is loftier than yours and mine?
I have, for example, heard that the Baal Shem Tov made such a claim. In that event I would agree that it is impossible to draw an upper bound. In the absense of such claim I see no reason not to.
not that your and my little minds have any idea what that really means
Certainly mine does not. Please define “they” in modern day terms. Please direct me to a gadol who claims to see without eyes and hear without ears.
I was trying to establish some common ground as to the limits on both ends of that statement. I can agree with you that the advice I receive from a gadol in areas where others might use “common sense” to decide is both more sound than common sense and is binding on the advice seeker. I had hoped that you might agree to my statement that advice in areas that require divination can be no more than advice, and then we could discuss middle ground. But alas, it seems that you refuse to impose an upper bound.
I simply used that issue as a clear example. I am not particularly interested in an answer that specifically addresses that example – how about in general.
Can we assume all are agreed that the scope of the statement about D”T is limited to the ability of Torah scholars to offer sage and sound advice only, and not that they possess the ability to divine and identify the underlying causes and nature of the tevva?
Do you think that statement can be made simply on the grounds of D”T, and if so, how is that possible?
oomis, thanks for making me smile 🙂
It would seem that we are thinking of the term “worrying about” in different ways. I agree that we should all be concerned for each others’ well-being, and see to it that no one has to go hungry or be cold etc. Similarly, in ruchniyos we should make sure everyone has the opportunity to learn Torah, send their children to yeshivos ktanos, be able to spend shabbos in a shomer shabbos home, etc. I do not agree with anyone who says we should worry about or check up on anyone else’s ruchniyos or gashmiyos for the sake of keeping track of their personal choices and decisions.
Wolf,
I always admire your ability to find the flaw in fallacious arguments. I am not comparing the situations but I find ludicrous the suggestion that a lack of availability is G-d’s way of telling us to drop something.
The lack of kosher meat implies a drop in production, not the end of kashrus laws. The lack of modest clothing implies a drop in demand, not a restatement of tsnius laws.
rescue37
Member
chesedname
maybe it is a sign from himmel that the lenght may actually be ok and all the shreing is about chumras.
You are misinterpreting the sign from the himmel.
When there was a kosher meat shortage, did you think it was a sign from the himmel to buy Perdue chicken?
When there is a shidduch crisis is it a sign from the himmel to intermarry?
Chollilo
rescue37
Member
chesedname
how about worrying about yennems gashmius and your own frumkeit.
Better would be to not be involved in yennem’s anything.
laguy
Member
The word “need” is somewhat debateable. When a school can’t make its payroll they NEED to do something more fiscally responsible.
I like what you are saying. However, you need to realize that what you said is a chiddush gamor to yeshivos. Currently the accepted situation is that when a school can’t make its payroll the director makes phone calls and says Nu Rabboisai! We NEED money!
If your way of thinking were in place, I agree that it would be very easy to try different cost cutting methods.
“Rebbeim are already paid less than most other professions”
I have no idea how much Rebbeim are being paid, but I fully expect that it would be less than other professionals. There is no shortage of candidates, there is no training required (other than sitting and learning for a few years, which so many are doing now anyway), there are no end of perks, AND they are working for non-profit organizations.
It is not fair to compare that to a doctor/lawyer/accountant/therapist/engineer/architect or any other profession that a) requires standardized training which excludes many people who would otherwise want to join the profession (creating scarcity), b) works a minimum of 40 hours a week, and it is not uncommon to find them working overtime on nights, weekends, legal holidays at no extra pay, c) works for a profit oriented company or firm, whose goal is to motivate employees to maximize profit, d) receives no extras that are not on paper e) is usually forced to work outside the “arbah koislei beis medrash”.
To those who are concerned that US dairy farmers may be skirting the laws and slipping in some pigs milk:
It is not only that they are forbidden by law, it is also nearly impossible to pull off from a logistical point of view. If you want to worry about something, you can worry about all the goyishe workers in the kosher restaurants you patronize. Despite having multiple reliable hashgochos and a mashgiach t’middi, it is much more likely that something gets slipped in there. Visit a dairy farm, then visit a restaurant kitchen, and rest your own case.
I meant your regular one
Totally misunderstood- sorry, your comment makes sense now.
Well, the status quo doesn’t affect me that much. But I hear from plenty of people who have young children in school and not enough income. To say they are OK with it because they don’t open their own school is fallacious reasoning – they would have to quit their job and borrow a lot of money just to get a new school off the ground, never mind the fact that they don’t have the slightest bit of expertise or knowledge of how to run the place.
forgot your login?
dvorak-
Down payment? How much of a loan do you think they qualify for? If I were a bank loaning money to people whose only income was a stipend per child and chaluka, I wouldn’t lend more than the equity. With 150 paid for and a value of 300, I might (only might) lend the other 150.
volvie-
That is essentially the difference between the FDA and the USDA.
volvie –
Of course they would not be thrown out to PS. But you are still better off than before because the school has been changed to operate on a fixed budget. It is spending less frivolously. If some of the money it expects does not come through, a debt is owed to the school. The school can no longer be the tzedaka box. The almanah with 10 children should place her tuition burden on the local Rav, just as she would place her need for food and shelter.
GAW-
I think you and I both know that a community funded school will never work. How do you define community? What stops anyone who has no kids in school from opting out?
The 9K figure you quote is way too high. Does a class really need 270K to pay its teachers and administrators? Also, teachers may demand higher salaries, but they can’t command more than a regular job 9-5 12 months a year that gets no tuition breaks either.
volvie-
Out of the 25%, probably half of them could do it if they strained themselves the way people are straining today. For the other half (including kollel, rabbinate, or other families with lower income) if there is no scholarship money available then they are forced to solicit funds directly. This too, is no different from the obligations that schools place on their parent body except that in this case most parents would be exempt.
Personally, I think donations would be plentiful, even from tuition paying parents. Think about the upper 25% instead of the lower 25. These families are either high income or families with few children and decent income. They are probably comfortable enough and happy with the tuition levels so that they would voluntarily want to help the lower 25. Plus there are alumni, grandparents, and businesses who will all look for tax deductions from time to time. This model can work.
That little money? Let’s play some more with the numbers.
Assume the school is full. Put 30 students in a class, each paying 5000. Each class is 150K in revenue. I see no difficulty in staffing the class with a full day’s curriculum using 2/3 of the money or less. That leaves 50K per class to pay administrators, buy (used) textbooks, pay their share of housing expense of the school, etc. I further expect that this structure (fixed funding model) would lead to schools building an economies of scale to maximize efficiency of spending.
My model for comparison is any charter school. Have a look at how they run. They receive a fixed amount per student and have no compunctions with cutting extra programs or classes due to budget limitations. Not so the public school system with its rubber budget, and unfortunately – the yeshivos who operate as though they have a rubber budget.
volvie?
Chalav Yisroel is not an ends in and of itself. It is a means to the end of ensuring that the milk is from a cow (or another kosher animal, as it were). The question is if Chalav Stam is halachically considered reliably cows milk, not if it is considered CY.
A rate that 75% can afford without losing sleep does not mean that the other 25% can’t afford it at all.
Let me make up some numbers here. Let’s say it is reasonable to expect a family has 100K income. If you divide the number of children in school by the number of families, you have a rough idea of how many children there are per family (of course, some adjustment for children in multiple schools is needed). Let’s say the average is 6 per family. It might be reasonable to arrive at $5K per child. This would mean that a family with 6 children in school pays $30K. If they earn 100K this is doable without debt. There would be some strain entering the budget for this family if they earned say, 85K or less.
25% of families might have more children or less income or both. They might decide to home school some children rather than find ways to pay, or they might not be able to homeschool. If they decide to send all their kids to school then they will have to apply for scholarship (from voluntarily donated money, like respectable institutions do, not like yeshivos do now), or raise money for the school through dinner campaigns, or trade services to the school, or a thousand other options. Or, they might live in debt. But the point is that 75% have no sweat.
Ability to pay is a private matter. No one has the right to know that information unless it is offered.
SJS – You missed what I said entirely. The tuition has to be set at a rate that every average family can afford. It is not a school for rich families at all.
hereorthere- you are definitely mistaken on both counts. Pouring Ch”Stam into a CY container accopmlishes nothing but deceit. Mixing pigs milk into USDA milk is against the law (unless marked so), and impossible to hide given the large scale nature of USDA milk production and the tight daily surveillance.
Clearly it’s not him…..
GAW –
Tada! You said it exactly.
The way to establish a system that works is to eliminate donation dependency. Schools should not depend on donations to survive and neither should parents.
The problem is not in fixing the percent of income that can be afforded, but in fixing a per child amount. A family with 7 children cannot afford to pay more tuition than a family with 6 children, and that is the problem here. More kids <> more income, ergo, more kids = more scholarship. Every tuition bill requires personal tailoring, and that’s a problem.
Tuition per child needs to be fixed at an amount that is affordable on a per child basis, considering the ability to pay of a high percentage of member families (I made up 75% as a figure). Schools must live with that amount, whatever it is. Families that do not earn enough to pay for all their children will need to do one of two things:
a) Raise their personal shortfall by soliciting tax deductible donations
b) Home school one or more children for all or part of the day so that the final tuition bill is in their means.
I don’t see why 75% of families (or more) have to break their backs to provide to their children something neither they nor their neighbor can afford.
With all the kvetching about money spent on weddings and bar mitzvahs, you would think that someone could think of relating that argument to the school. After all, schools are much larger scale than individuals and should be a more worthwhile endeavor.
SJS-
When I was in school, we had no air conditioning at home either, never mind in school! I assume it is standard today.
The person who spends the most time on this site is actually someone who hasn’t posted in a long while. Come on, you know you don’t like lurking….
Don’t let SJS see this thread! Are you really indulging in cheesecake instead of paying full tuition? 😛
SJS, not being in the education market myself, I am unaware of what it is that Lakewood schools are compromising relative to Frisch to create such a disparity. I can only assume that the Lakewood schools are sacrificing education.
If they are sacrificing education, then their tuition could be further lowered by consolidating and eliminating waste from their expenses. I am imagining these schools have little or no secular education, but run heat and a/c at excessive levels, have small classes and have resource rooms. So I wouldn’t call it a rich man’s “school” but it is a rich man’s “single subject school”. Frisch probably spares no expense in any regard.
I am thinking of tuition takkanos a la chasuna takkanos.
TT- I find the story amusing, but what is your point? Are the cholov yisroel companies really just buying milk at Costco and pouring it into their bottles?
P.S. For folks such as SJS, there can always be a ‘rich man’s school’. No problem with that. The problem is that every school today is a rich man’s school.
EJ is again absolutely correct. The issue of tapping equity is ridiculous. It is only due to a complete lack of financial sophistication that one could suggest such a thing*.
Going into debt for recurring expenses is a financial disaster. It is alright to take out debt for large non recurring expenses (e.g. buying a house or car, financing a wedding or a move, etc) as long as you expect future income to cover it. But debt for predictable, recurring expenses is a big no-no. It can only lead to bankruptcy.
The only solution is for tuition to be an amount that can be afforded year after year based on actual after-tax earnings. Tuition has to be capped at a level that more than 75% of families can afford based on earnings. The schools must find a way to live on this amount, no excuses. If that means 35 kids in a class, used textbooks, A/C at 73 degrees, and no landscaping, then so be it. It will be no worse than the current state.
*The only sound reasoning for suggesting that one taps equity is to prevent clever people from hiding assets by paying down a mortgage.
The point is clear. The OP is mistaken in saying that Chalav Yisroel is comparable to Chalav Stam. There are glaring differences in avaiability, whether your are looking for organic, competitive price, freshness that lasts longer than it takes to bring your purchase home, variety in choice of products (especially chocolate/chocolate mix), or even simply to be able to buy kosher products bearing an OU-D.
Plus, has anyone ever heard of a pig dairy farm? USDA is the best regulating authority in America. It is thousands of times more competent than the FDA. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind that the only milk harvested in dairy farms in America is cow milk. There’s not much you can trust in government these days, but milk is one of the things you can (I wonder why….). Chalav Yisroel is simply a chumra, like any other chumra. The actual milk you are drinking does not contain a higher percentage of cow milk than Chalav Stam. Guaranteed.
Well said, EJ. It is the yeshivos (and their staff) that need to learn to make do with less, before they ask the parents to do so. There is literally no end to the amount of additional good service the yeshivos can provide to children, but the cost is prohibitive and should be disallowed.