Jewish Education Center To Leave Upper West Side After 38 Years

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — A Jewish education center that opened nearly 40 years ago on the Upper West Side is set to leave the neighborhood. The Drisha Institute for Jewish Education announced that it will leave its space of the last 14 years on West 65th Street between Broadway and Central Park West and transition to a new organizational model.

The Drisha Institute is leaving its space in order to expand the reach of its programs in the United States and Israel, according to a letter spread on the center's social media pages.

"The redeployment of resources will enable Drisha's core programs to reach larger and more diverse audiences, fulfilling our mission of bringing high-level and transformative learning - where a learner can truly be his/her self, without denominational or other constraints or bounds - to the community at large," the letter reads.

The center will continue to host educational programs during the spring, but the programming will not be under the same roof. Instead, Drisha's programs will be offered at synagogues on both the Upper West and East sides. The spring schedule will feature ten weekly programs such as the Drishat Shalom Fellowship for collegiates and young professionals, the Dirshu series, the Beit Midrash for Mental Health Professionals, the center announced.

The locations where programs will be held have not been announced.

"As we have seen over the last several months - through countless hours of conversations - there is a tremendous thirst for high-level, high-quality, rigorous and transformative Torah learning that has no agenda other than to enable individuals to learn, internalize and grow. All of us at Drisha remain committed to fulfilling that mission," the center's letter reads.

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