The man leading from

After spending 40 years setting the agenda for Jewish schools, Alastair Falk could teach you a thing or two about education

ALASTAIR FALK learned some important lessons during his teaching career — not least that having a sense of humour is essential.

It is no surprise, then, that between stepping down as executive director of Partnerships for Jewish Schools (PaJeS) and taking on a new educational role in Birmingham, he had a brief stint last week at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, where he performed his one-man show, Much Ado About Noshing.

“Performing is the hobby,” he says. “It’s like taking a long assembly.”

A teacher by profession, Falk, 60, has implemented some of the biggest changes to the community.

He served as the founding head of one of the largest Jewish schools in the UK, King Solomon High in Redbridge; he led a JLC-backed commission into the future of Jewish education, and then headed the education agency PaJeS in response to its findings. He has since spent the past six years steering the way headteachers interact, react to government policy and train staff.

Along the way, Falk helped set up a little event called Limmud. Not bad for a person who “escaped a future in law” — twice.

He says: “We started Limmud in 1980, after I visited the Centre for the Advancement of Jewish Education (CAJE) in the US. They said everyone has a part to play in the educational process — parents, teachers, youth workers, shuls.

“You have one young person travelling through these stopping posts, yet they rarely communicate. The dynamic may have shifted, and parents do have more power, but it is still an issue.”

Another concern was narrowing the gap between a child’s regular education and their Jewish one.

“In the 1980s, we had few schools. The situation is different now — in London, most Jewish children attend a faith school. But it is still a question: how far have we narrowed that gap? And is it really a good idea to close it?”

Raised in Sheffield, Falk went to the City of London School for Boys in Westminster before reading History at Cambridge. He has been committed ever since to disentangling schooling from education, especially when it comes to faith.

“There is a paradox about Jewish education: the more successful you are, the less successful you are. Schools today are all about results, data, and achievements,” he says.

“If you’re based in a school’s Jewish Studies department, you have to do what other departments do: get good exam grades, line kids up, divide them into sets based on ability. But that is the opposite of what you want to do with Jewish education.

“If I get an A in my Jewish Studies

If I get an A in my Jewish Studies GCSE and you get a B, am I a better Jew?