The Federation of Jewish Communities operates an ever-growing network of educational institutes. Alongside the scope and variety of venues operating throughout the Former Soviet Union, a need for teachers, rabbis and professionals has seen the establishment of institutes for higher learning.
The Beit Chana teacher’s college opened in 1995, and today provides teaching certificate and masters degrees to dozens of teachers each year. The full-time training curriculum is endorsed by both the Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science, and the Israeli Ministry of Education and Culture; and the institute also organizes training courses for working teachers – updating them on innovative Jewish educational resources, and putting new teaching methods into practice.
Several university-level institutions of higher learning have also been established, to help fight the FSU’s chronic brain-drain by providing quality academic and professional training, supplemented by Hebrew classes and Jewish studies.
But perhaps most important is the chain of fifteen yeshiva university campuses. More than 700 students study rabbinical studies – some in order to take up posts as rabbis, teachers and scholars in Jewish communities throughout the Former Soviet Union, others who have interrupted their college studies in order to later share their newly gained wealth with their communities, families and children.