The Ministry of Education publicized its list of the rate of students in 12th grade taking the Bagrut exams in the various cities and towns for the previous school year. You can see the full list, but it is not very exciting, unless you are looking for something specific. In case you were wondering, Bet Shemesh is about 2/3 of the way down the list, with 48.71% of 12th grade students taking the exams, slightly down from the past two years (49+%).

The various radio stations were talking to different mayors and heads of regional councils and other community representatives about the percentages form their towns, and if they have been on an upward or downward trend, and what they plan to do to improve their towns numbers. The city of Bnei Braq issued a response that Bnei Braq is a haredi city in which 90.5% of the students do not take the Bagrut exams, btu amogn thsoe students that do, they achieve among the best results in the country. I happened to hear Yitzchak Ravitz, a Degel representative from Beitar Ilit be interviewed, and he had an interesting response.

The lists show that at the very bottom of the list appear all the Haredi towns and cities, with the lowest percentages. I don't see this as any surprise, as in Haredi communities, the boys dont take the tests, most of the girls dont take the tests, and most of the boys dont even learn the material for the tests. For ideological reasons.

When the radio host asked Ravitz for his response, she asked him if he sees it as bad or maybe he sees it as a sign of honor. Ravitz had an interesting response. Ravitz said that the picture presented is not complete or accurate. 50% of the students in Beitar are girls, and the girls take the external Szold exams, and they achieve great results on them, but these statistics do not take the Szold exams into account even though the Ministry of Education decided last year to equate the Szold exams to the Bagrut exams.

So, that already bumps Beitar, and all the Haredi towns and cities, up to the middle of the list.

Then, Ravitz continued, the boys don't learn the general studies due to worldview, but they learn gemara. He went on to explain that gemara is much more difficult and provides much more extensive of an education and exercise fo the mind, in thought process, analysis, reading comprehension, etc. Furthermore, even for the requirements of the workforce, the gemara provides a far superior training and development of the mind of the students than does a general education.

So really Beitar and the other haredi towns are only at the bottom of the list, because the list is looking at the wrong information. Really Beitar and the other Haredi towns are at the top of the educational list...