Education Minister Naftali Bennett announces there are 300 new first grade classrooms as the nation’s public school system opens on Sunday, 15 Elul. Bennett is placing an emphasis on curtailing overcrowding in classrooms, announcing the maximum number of students for a first grade class is 34 in strong area and a maximum of 32 students in weaker areas.

Bennett’s office released the list of new classrooms on Monday, 9 Elul and included in this list are dozens of classrooms in the Arab sector, large cities and many communities around the country. There will be 23 new classrooms in the capital, 7 in Ashkelon, and 26 in the Arab and Druse sectors. In the southern Bedouin community of Rahat for example there will be new classrooms opening in eight different schools.

Residents of Yehuda and Shomron who looked at the list saw that while there are many new classrooms around the country in the Jewish, Arab and Druse sectors, they realize that in addition to a construction freeze, there appears to be a freeze on new classrooms in schools throughout Yehuda and Shomron. New classrooms will be opened in only two communities in all of Yehuda and Shomron, in Elkana and Karnei Shomron, and in just two schools. Once again, the Bayit Yehudi party-affiliated education minister brings major disappointment to his constituents.

With a high birthrate on yishuvim and a large growing young population, residents and leaders of communities throughout Yehuda and Shomron took it for granted that a Bayit Yehudi education minister would go the extra mile for schools in this sector but in actuality, the exact opposite is today’s reality.

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)