Oklahoma Jewish charter school expects only 10 students, per email to Tulsa rabbi

OKLAHOMA CITY — A first-in-the-nation Jewish charter school seeking to open in Oklahoma expects to enroll only 10 students — far short of original projections — in its first year of operation, according to an email the school’s leading founder sent to local faith leaders.

The low enrollment goal has raised doubts about the viability and local support of Ben Gamla Jewish Charter School as it aims to become the first taxpayer-funded religious charter school in the country.

The Statewide Charter School Board could vote Monday on Ben Gamla’s application to open, according to its next meeting agenda. The board initially rejected the school because it would teach the tenets of the Jewish faith along with secular school subjects, but an Oklahoma City federal judge decided last month a charter school can’t be denied solely because it would provide a faith-based education.

Although it denied the school’s application, the board has advocated for Ben Gamla in court, and it supported a previous attempt to open a Catholic charter school in the state.

“The Statewide Charter School Board will consider the order of the court and may make their decision based on that order on Monday,” the board’s attorney, A.J. Ferate, said. “I do not know and I cannot speak to what decision the board will make, but I do believe that a decision will be made on that.”

The school’s founders, led by former U.S. Rep. Peter Deutsch, of Florida, first applied in December for state approval. Their application projected Ben Gamla would enroll between 335 and 495 students K-12 in its first year as an online school.

Now, Ben Gamla is preparing to launch in September 2027 as a high school with an “intentionally modest” enrollment goal of 10 students, Deutsch wrote in a Sept. 30 email to a Tulsa rabbi, who publicized the message on Thursday.

Attorneys representing Deutsch, the school and the statewide board declined to comment on the email.

“Although our initial school in Oklahoma will be an online high school, our long-term vision is much broader: to establish Jewish religious charter schools serving students from kindergarten through 12th grade in communities throughout the country,” Deutsch wrote in the email.

Rabbi Daniel Kaiman, who leads Congregation B’nai Emunah in Tulsa, said he was surprised to receive Deutsch’s message and an invitation to apply to be the school’s founding principal. Kaiman is part of a group of Oklahomans who sued to block the school from opening.

In a statement through his legal counsel, Kaiman said the email signals how Deutsch and the proposed school are “completely disconnected from the Oklahoma Jewish community.”

“It also shows how little our community wants this,” Kaiman stated Thursday. “Perhaps most importantly, it shows that this school is nothing but a Trojan horse for creating religious public schools. We don’t need or want this school. We want strong public schools and to keep church and state separate.”

Other Jewish communal leaders received the same or similar email, said Rachel Johnson, executive director of the Jewish Federation of Greater Oklahoma City.

Johnson said she isn’t aware of interest among the local community in enrolling or working for the proposed school.

Although not a recipient of Deutsch’s email, Rabbi Abby Jacobson, of Emanuel Synagogue in Oklahoma City, said she wasn’t surprised to hear the proposed school is expecting so few students.

For years, Oklahoma’s Jewish community has repeatedly said “no thank you” to the idea of a religious charter school in the state, she said.

“I can’t say that no one in the local community would support it, but I would say that I haven’t spoken to anybody who would,” Jacobson said.

The “miniscule” enrollment estimate demonstrates Ben Gamla lacks essential community support and is financially and operationally unviable, wrote multiple national legal organizations — including the American Civil Liberties Union, the Education Law Center and Americans United for Separation of Church and State — in a letter Thursday.

The legal groups are representing Kaiman and other Oklahoma residents fighting the Jewish charter school in court. Their letter urged the Statewide Charter School Board to again deny the school from opening.

The Oklahoma Attorney General’s Office, which also has raised concerns over Ben Gamla’s enrollment estimates, confirmed it received the letter and is reviewing it.

Attorney General Gentner Drummond filed a lawsuit in March in Oklahoma County District Court, contending the Statewide Charter School Board intentionally “manipulated” its vote on the school to benefit Ben Gamla’s chances in court. 

The board solely focused on the school’s religious component and left out other valid reasons for denial, like an abrupt tenfold increase in its enrollment projections, he argued.

In a letter of intent submitted in November, Deutsch initially estimated Ben Gamla would serve 40 high school students. A month later, the school’s formal application projected it would enroll hundreds of students K-12.

The board should have considered that discrepancy a “material deficiency” and grounds for denial, Drummond said.