Borough Park, NY – Ads are starting to appear on one of the city’s last bastions of commercial-free space – the yellow school bus.
And it’s happening far away from Madison Ave., at yeshivas in Borough Park, Brooklyn.
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Two cash-starved schools in the heavily Hasidic Jewish area have allowed a religious textbook publisher to turn their yellow buses into mobile billboards.
“Times are extremely hard, and we need the income that comes in,” said Rabbi Mayer Weinberger, executive director of one of the schools, Yeshiva Chasan Sofer.
“Reactions were pretty positive because we screened the ad.”
The banner, which appears on the sides of nine buses, shows a smiling boy holding a religious book called a Chumash. The Yiddish caption, referring to the publisher, reads: “Everyone goes to school with Oz V’Hadar.”
Chumash is another name for the Torah – a bedrock of Judaism and one of the first texts taught at a yeshiva. The ad hawks an updated and illustrated edition.
“We wanted something out of the ordinary so every kid can see this book,” said Meny Hoffman of the Ptex Group, the agency that came up with the campaign.
Because there are no TVs in ultra-Orthodox homes and Internet use by kids is banned or strictly limited, his firm needed another medium, Hoffman said.
He was aware that advertisements on school buses could be a contentious issue, with parents rallying against commercialism in education.
“These are very kosher type of ads,” Hoffman said. “The concern is who’s going to monitor these ads [in the future].”
Josh Golin, director of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, warned of a slippery slope. “Anytime you advertise in a school bus or a school setting, you are exploiting a captive audience,” he said.
But, he added, the Borough Park ads seem “very consistent with what the yeshivas are teaching in the classrooms, so it’s hard to object.”
In the mid-90s, the city allowed public service announcements on public school buses for a few years, but buses have been virtually ad-free since, according to the Department of Education.
The Borough Park schools – Chasan Sofer and Yeshiva Yagdil Torah – are private with about 400 students each. Five more yeshivas may follow suit, Hoffman said.
Weinberger said he plans to accept the ads “as long as they’re willing to pay,” provided the banners have “educational validity” and are “gentle and low-key.”
He wouldn’t reveal how much his yeshiva makes selling the bus space except to say that “it’s not a lot of money, but even a few dollars help.”
Editors Note:
In an exclusive interview with VIN News this week, SG Transportation president Mr. Sender Gurowitz of Brooklyn downplayed the significance of the ads. “There are zero revenues for the Gerrer Yeshiva from the ads,” he said when asked about the bus ads to appear soon for the Yagdil Torah yeshivah, which is subcontracting the transportation through his firm. “Except it helps SG reduce their expenses, to save the yeshivas to keep raising the fees to parents for transportation.”
I think an appropiate name for this venture would be, “Bu$-ne$$”!
Way to go Rabbi Weinberger you are a great Administrator
“In the mid-90s, the city allowed public service announcements on public school buses for a few years, but buses have been virtually ad-free since, according to the Department of Education.”
So, according to that paragraph in the article, the ads on the yeshiva school buses is NOT the “last bastion” as was claimed earlier in the article.
In fact, the Board of Education has been doing so for about 15 years (& continues to do so, despite their claims to the contrary).
So why the erroneous claim by the Daily News?
Can it be beause a “money hungry Jew” story helps sell newspapers?
Here is a thought. How about the city paying for ad space letting drivers know the seriousness of passing a buss when the light are blinking.
parents have to draw the line in not letting these money-making institutions invade your privacy and create a nuisance with one’s children.
I am almost positive that ads on the side of a school bus, are still illegal. A few years past companies got past the legalities, by posting public service announcements, with the sponsors logo on it.
how about gov. funding to yeshiva’s our hard earned tax money is going to fund public schools where there are drug adicts, shooting, guns ,etc .
our rebbi’s in yeshiva’s are not getting paid on time (if they get paid at all), our eductaion system is in danger of not getting qualified rebbi’s and teachers no body can afford to work without pay. qualified mecanchaim our all getting degrees and getting paid by the govt’…
1-800-bus -4-kids….1-800-bus-4-kids…read those ads today..
maybe boars head will buy ads?
Anything that raises badly needed money is fair game. Try to keep the barely clad models and simliar stuff to a minimum so we don’t get screams of “tzinius” but otherwise, any ads for what is legal between conseenting adults should be alllowed.
“Except it helps SG reduce their expenses, to save the yeshivas to keep raising the fees to parents for transportation.”
Every little bit helps, as costs are constantly rising for cash strapped parents.
As long as it’s done within reason, it’s hard to object.
the fist thing they should do is put less kids on a bus some of the bus’s are jamed.
As a father of kids in this Yeshiva I think if they could keep our cost down and monitor the ads, let them fill up all sides of the buses!
Those kids on the AD wears long pyess which does NOT resemble chasan sofer or yagdil torah…
Kudos to Rabbi Weinberger for an original idea, but please, no ads for food or nosh!
I see no problem with advertising on the side of a school bus as long as it follows proper decorum according to our hashkofos.
Rabbi Weinberger is a tzaddik. If he needs todo this I trust his judgement.
Also Chsan Sofer has many kids in the younger grades with long payes. Boruch Hasdhem the oilem is getting more chassidish.
hollywood is calling
In response to those that are upset that the bus is making extra stops
Try to look at it from the point of view of a mother of young children
This is my story, but 10 years ago. Now all my kids are able to go to the corner by themselves, and they do. But when they were little…
I have boy/girl twins. They were assigned to different bus stops since they went to different schools. I am not sure why the stops were set that way. I shmeared the bus drivers to stop at my house. I had a little baby at home when they were in 1st grade (plus a preschooler). (I thank Hashem every day for my blessings).
How was I supposed to be or 2 corners at once, shlepping the preschooler and the baby, in the rain, in the cold, etc.
The truth is in my case I was considerate and asked my neighbors if they minded having the children ALL (gasp, the boys and the girls) wait in my house instead of the 2 corners. So I didn’t add any stops, but I did illegally move the stop to my house so that I could be home with the baby and not have to be in 2 places at once. It worked well for the neighbors too, because they knew they had me to watch their kids.
Anyway, when you see the bus stopping at each house, realize that there might be a very overwhelmed mother inside. Public school kids all go to the same school, but yeshiva kids go to different schools and you can have to wait for 3 or 4 busses a day.
I don’t see something wrong about ads on buses. Why shouldn’t our mosdos also make some money from ads especially if it keeps trans fee down
Rabbi Weinberger is a tzaddik. If he needs todo this I trust his judgement.
Also Chsan Sofer has many kids in the younger grades with long payes. Boruch Hasdhem the oilem is getting more chassidish.
“hire a babysitter or a nanny” – that’s ridiculous. who has the money for that? and what, hire a babysitter every morning for 10 minutes? who’s gonna come to your house for 10 minutes? I live in Willy, and as annoying as all the multiple stops are, I thank HaShem for door to door transp. What am I supposed to do if my baby is asleep at 3 p.m. when the bus arrives home? leave my baby alone at home and run to the corner? when it’s freezing cold, I’d have to bundle him – and all the other kids I might have at home – and run to the corner? BH i can just go downstairs and can leave my baby in the hallway or even upstairs and listen in on the monitor. I make sure to be there five minutes earlier so no one is inconvenienced by my bus. But your statement about hiring a nanny is ridiculous. We’d need several hundred nannies for the same 10 minutes in the entire town if door to door transp would stop. (the older kids who can walk down the block themselves do get one stop per block. but kids under five shouldnt have to walk to the corner themsleves, and the mothers cant always go!) and what about when I was 2 weeks postpartum and very weak and could barely make it just down my own stairs? Let met 3 yr old go to the corner himself?
Sometimes, I think, that the peyos are getting longer but the mothers’ skirts are getting shorter. I’m a long time YCS mother, so I see the changes