A brewing scandal in the girls’ seminary acceptance process has sent shockwaves through the frum world, as multiple seminaries have defied a predetermined agreement and begun accepting students prematurely—threatening to unravel the entire admissions system.
According to an agreement among seminaries in Eretz Yisroel, no acceptances were to be issued before March 3rd. However, several seminaries have jumped the gun, calling high school seniors with acceptance offers and pressuring them to commit within hours. This reckless move threatens to upend the structured process, much like the chaos that recently plagued the mesivta acceptances in Lakewood when certain yeshivos disregarded agreed-upon timelines, sending other yeshivos, schools, parents, and talmidim alike scrambling to be accepted into a mesivta.
While some argue that the more established seminaries hold high schools hostage—demanding the best students and leaving newer seminaries struggling to establish themselves—it is widely agreed that breaking the rules is not the solution. Instead of undermining the system, these seminaries should seek to resolve their grievances through proper negotiations.
In response to this troubling situation, a major crackdown is already underway. Mrs. Raizel Reit of TTI, a key player in the seminary college credit and financial system, has taken concrete moves to bring an end to the chaos. TTI, which helps parents save between $9,000 and $17,000 on tuition, has issued a stern warning: any seminary that defies the agreed-upon process will be banned from partnering with TTI.
Mrs. Reit’s statement was clear: “TTI would like to require our partner seminaries to comply with the Vaad’s requirements… Any seminary not in compliance will be barred from partnering with TTI and will be unable to participate until the Vaad confirms their compliance.”
As this crisis unfolds, the question remains: will the rogue seminaries back down, or will this be the beginning of a complete overhaul of the seminary admissions process?
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44 Responses
This collusion violates antitrust law. TTIs threats are quite illegal and this collusion could result in civil and criminal penalties.
Or even better: will this be the end of the seminary system altogether?
Let’s hope.
Honestly I am just sick and tired of the way our entire system is being run. So wrong. Nothing is honest about our chiunuch system. Very disheartening to say the least.
Why don’t we name these vigilantes and this will stop dead in its tracks?
These seminaries treat the girls like a deck of cards. It’s disgusting. The entire system. Everything about the seminary system is DISGUSTING.
I have 5 girls who went to seminary. 4 different ones. The process stinks. And they are going to preach good midos to our daughters?
Bunch of reshoyim. I can write a book about the 5 years of seminary my girls had. Were there good things? yes. But I am going out on a limb and willing to say that even if ONE NESHAMA is hurt – EVEN ONE – then shut this entire stupid trainwreck down. not to mention its bankrupting every Frum family.
ENOUGH! AD KAN.
If anyone had a daughter that went through the system, its horrible to the girls.
When will this horror show and and stop it once and for all?
We’ve been hearing alot of “Shut them down” in regard to President Trump and much of the abuse/fraud he has found through DOGE. I would think “Seminary” should be one of the things he shuts down next!
If everyone would agree NOT to send girls to Eretz Yisroel, the amount of money that could be saved is ASTRONOMICAL!
i dont want to chas vesholom talk about rabbonim or gedolim, but they are also in this like all of us. know why? because they also know that if they didnt send their girls to seminary, then people will ask by shidduchim ”
whats wrong with her? why didnt she go to seminaray”?
Any seminary head that can’t follow rules of an agreement should have zero issues when their students break rules as well, right? I mean, that’s how we learn, by example!! Such a great way to teach about responsibility and following directions! Same for the high schools!
This would be a golden opportunity to stop the entire seminary nonsense.
I think Elon Musk and DOGE should do a real expose into the seminary situation. We all know it’s the biggest scam ever and we are suckered into it.
Oh no TTI is making a threat. Sara Shneir will just step in, and if they also stop, than Touro will step in. You know why? Because they’re businesses just like all the Seminaries.
This entire system stinks to high heavens. Everything about the seminary system.
****NEWSFLASH****
Mrs. Raizel Reit of TTI IS A HERO.
Don’t worry. The frummie mafia will get to her and threaten and bully her life. DO NOT CAVE TO THE RESHOYIM.
Having had daughters in the Seminaries and seeing first hand, I must defend and say that many and the vast majority of Seminaries are doing great work in chinuch habonos and perhaps we should be careful to avoid using stam generelizing rechilus. It is a system at large that has done remarkable work in chinuch for our Torah world, with regular guidance of Gedolim that are consulted.
Having said that, I must agree we need to need to inforce strict adherence to agreed acceptance policy, otherwise it truly is becoming used by some, as our children being pawns for business or pushing up numbers c”v and that is so so wrong and incorrect.
The point and purpose of a vaad must be to enforce and navagate this, to maintain yashrus across the board.
Wow! A lot of jaded people jumping on the bash-the-whole chinuch-system bandwagon. I will speak up for the silent majority (who are sick of being jumped and bashed and insulted and have stopped commenting) and say that I am very happy with the overwhelming majority of what the overwhelming majority of chinuch institutions do. By and large, those who have gone into chinuch – a largely thankless job – do so for idealistic reasons, and work l’Shem Shamayim selflessly. If there are issues, let us deal with them – in a balanced way.
To call a large group of people “a bunch of reshoyim”, for example, or to refer to “the entire chinuch system” as dishonest, are excellent ways to lose one’s Olam Haba (Ayin Sefer Chofetz Chaim on Motzei Shem Ra). These would NOT be balanced.
Speaking as a high school senior in an established Lakewood high school, All students are aware of the tight race to get into seminary. It is a grueling process within of itself that leaves many great girls feeling inadequate and insecure. We students heard rumors that this was happening and went to our seminary advisor, she told she discussed it with the seminaries and it’s just rumor. Whether it is or it isn’t is irrelevant, my point is IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH YESHIVA WORLD!! This is a real issue that is affecting real girls!! I don’t want to know how many girls are going in to complete panic because of this article. This is a matter that should not just be thrown around as the latest hock on the market. I hope you can understand where I am coming from, thank you.
To skythelimit, your use of the word “reshoim” pretty much speaks volumes about you & your middos…. Shadchanim beware!
What about the the parents that go into major credit card debt because if their daughter doesnt go to seminary in EY then it doesnt look good on her “shiduch resume” they pay 10s of thousands of dollars that they dont have just so they send her in hope for a good shiduch! Then you ” have to apply to at least 3″ the whole system is rigged and we keep falling into their trap year after year!!!
Insert lashon hara about other jews here
What is the purpose of this agreement?
Did these seminaries actually agree and are now violating their agreement?
How does it help them to have an earlier acceptance date?
Seriously. Heaven forbid we have a free market. There should be no timeline.
The Headline should read: “MAJOR SCANDAL: SEMINARIES”.
It is high time this 40k a year scam ends.
Can someone publish the seminary shmuessen on histapkus.
The darshener gets paid how many thousands per every histapkus shay-oor
BH I don’t have daughters
On the surface it seems 100% unfair but in reality it is making the process so much better for the girls because so many sem spots become available before main acceptances go out. It could actually save girls the humiliation and tears of getting waitlisted or not getting in anywhere. Because if Shira accepts one seminary early, she can drop the spots of the other 2-3 seminaries she could get into and someone else can get them!
Maybe there could be some chochma to this…
So don’t send.
Who arranges shidduchim anyway? Are you kidding?
One wonders how much of a setback to Moshiach’s arrival was caused by this blatant loshon ha’rah, rechilus, motzei shem ra laden article and it’s ensuing commentators. Oh, but it’s true! you claim, as if that’s some sort of heter. Oh but it’s for a to’eles, you claim. Since when does YWN have the mandate to ensure “justice”, and how to go about it? Just like Iran has proxies to create destruction, so does the sitra achara have proxies to prevent the geulah, many who don’t even realize that they’re in its control. Are you YWN one of them? How will you answer to Moshiach when he finally comes? Instead of taking on rectifying the seeming injustice (one may not believe loshon ha’ra even if it’s true, even if heard from Moshe Rabeinu, even if heard from YWN!), start rectifying your own shortcomings, like exposing thousands to videoclips of 1/3 dressed TV news anchorwomen reporting on Trump and Netanyahu, etc.
The sitra achara is mighty proud of you!
Hodu laShem, my three oldest daughters went to seminary in Brooklyn, affordable and home for Shabbos. Instead going to Fl at mid winter break, they went to E”Y to mekomos
hakedoshim [including amuka, of course]for 2 weeks. BH they were zoche to very prestigious husbands. My youngest daughter, however did go to seminary in Yerushalayim and benefited greatly although I went broke. She stayed for shona bet and suggested she make a deal with the owner because was unable to afford it. She paid him in full shortly after her wedding . Solution to the seminary problem, more seminarys in America to provide more good options to choose from.
If after 15 years of Bais Yaakov the girls are not ready for life…
Also know two girls that were told this year by the seminary don’t worry you will get a 10k scholarship- both of them from families who were absolutely not able to afford tuition and money had to be raised just to send their daughters to seminary at all.
(And yes, specific situations in both those homes made seminary very essential to them although generally I think it’s a waste)
And after the girls were already there both grants did not get approved
It caused a major crisis because these families could not afford even with the grant. I think that someone has been lying to people to push seminary by telling people they’re able to get the grant when they may not be able to. One family has a single working mom. I had to raise money to cover the missing 10k for one family because the seminary would not drop one penny off tuition and threatened to send her home .
This seminary business should be over and done with. It’s all hyped up, forcing families to shell out money so their daughter won’t ch”v be looked at as a nebach who didn’t go to sem. And those that say how “amazing” their seminary year was and how much they learned? Take a trip to Israel, listen to shiurim online, and you’ll save yourself a year plus won’t be out tens of thousands of dollars…
Enough is enough.
You’re all wrong!!! seminary is a year of growth, trips,vacations, eating out of tubs of ice cream in poor neighborhoods and spending shabbos at poor Israeli families finishing up their meager supplies, coming home invigorated and ready to get on their hands and knees to scrub the kitchen floor. The only thing that I don’t agree with is why they have to chain up all these
The entire frum system is a scandal
Acceptance crisis
Shidduch crisis
Shtellar crisis
Housing crisis
Babysitter crisis
Meatboards crisis
Private jet crisis
And on and on and on….
Where’s the Rabbonim? They only come out against texting, as if that’s the real crisis. I’m sure they have a cheshbon I just don’t get it.
It feels like the whole world is falling apart, mankind made the mess and it appears that we are getting deeper and deeper into the mess. We are not capable of fixing it, the longer the mess has gone on for, the bigger the mess has become, only Hashems mercy can redeem us now. We had our chance and we blew it. During these years Hashem has been seperating the men from the boys and the woman from the girls, we are nearly at the end, only those on the right side of Hashem will survive, only Hashem can decide who will take their place in His new world.
The negative comments here about seminaries has definitely NOT been our experience. We are forever grateful for the seminaries. If you can’t afford something you don’t buy it. I really don’t have much sympathy for people who buy things they can’t afford and then complain it’s too expensive.
Enough with this seminary nonsense. Nothing about it makes sense: the acceptance, the so called growth (which btw can be done in NY NJ or Honolulu!) the financial burden, no parental supervision, eating at fremda homes, the perfect shidduch….. Shut them down!!
To all the Chosheve commenters here:
A comment written by a seminary girl from Lakewood, she truly does have a valid point.
We have to be extremely careful not to hurt the feelings of these girls.
One of the most religious Jews I ever knew in my entire life refused to send his daughters to seminary, because he considered it to be a waste of time and money.
This was a man who knew all of Shas and all of Shulchan Aruch and did every chumrah.
Instead of sending his daughters to seminary, they got married and gave him grandchildren.
Online college courses culminating in an undergrad degree are not an option, apparently.
So, it seems, all the frum clothing stores had an agreement not to put out summer season clothes before Chanukah. Then a bunch broke the agreement and started to put out summer season clothes right after Sukkos! The chaos spread to the shoe stores, who started putting out summer shoe styles on Labor Day. Did you ever! These reshoyim are destroying the entire clothing buying system!! Oh? The article was about seminaries? Never mind.
I hope this kills the seminary system once and for all times.
I have 4 daughters. My oldest did not go to Seminary in Israel. She was my first daughter to get married. My next 3 went to “good Seminaries”. One of those is married. The other 2 are so far not. Seminary has nothing to do with whether you can find a shidduch.
When are families going to come together and mobilize together to boycott these money making seminaries once and for all , like Rabbi Dayan Fuerst from Chicago mentioned publicly many times.
Enough girls did seminary here in USA and it didnt cost them a shidduch.
The “elite” universities in the United States have the same problem. It is more of a nuisance than a major scandal. Given the high cost of going to Eretz Yisrael for yeshiva or seminary, it should be seen as a problem only for the wealthy.