Most students hear about five or six seminaries from friends, sisters and teachers, and choose among those. That works for plenty of people. It also means you can miss a school that fits you better, or end up somewhere because it's where your class goes. This guide gives you a simple way to choose on purpose.
Start with the year you want, not the name
Before you look at any school, write down your answers to these. Short answers are fine.
- What do you want to be better at by June? Reading a text on your own, Hebrew, davening, knowing halacha, something else?
- How do you learn best: sitting in class, working through a text with a chavruta (study partner), or discussion?
- How much structure do you want? Some schools set most of your schedule. Others have you build it from a big list of classes.
- How much of the year do you want to spend with Israelis, and how much with students from your own country?
- Do you want chesed (volunteering), art, music or an internship to be a fixed part of the week?
- What kind of place do you want to come home to at night: a campus dorm, or an apartment in a neighborhood?
Then use the things that really differ between schools
How the learning is set up
Look at the split between class time and beit midrash time (learning in pairs), and whether Gemara is offered, required or absent. You can filter our seminary list for schools that list Gemara, and each listing shows the subjects the school names on its own site.
The school's religious outlook
Schools describe themselves in their own words: Religious Zionist, Modern Orthodox, Bais Yaakov, Sephardic, Chabad, and so on. Some don't use a label at all. We show each school's own wording and never add one of our own, because a label means different things to different families. If the outlook matters to you, ask the school directly and talk to a recent student.
Size
A school with 30 students and a school with 130 are different experiences. Some schools publish their numbers and we list them where they do. Ask how many students are in a typical class and how many staff a student sees one-on-one.
Where it is
Seminaries are spread across Israel: in big cities, small towns, kibbutzim and hill villages. A city school usually means more to do on a free evening and easier travel. A campus, kibbutz or village usually means a closer group and more planning to get anywhere. Each listing gives the town and neighborhood, and you can filter the seminary list by area.
Living with or near Israelis
A few schools put overseas students in the same classes and dorms as Israelis. Others arrange a weekly chavruta or host families. Many are English-speaking throughout. If Hebrew and Israeli friends are a goal, filter for learning with Israelis and read exactly what each school offers, because it varies a lot.
Who else goes there
Ask which countries and which kinds of high schools the students come from. Some schools draw mostly from the US, some have big groups from the UK, South Africa or Australia, and some have South American or French-speaking tracks.
What happens on Shabbat and vacations
Ask how many Shabbatot are spent together, whether the dorm stays open on Shabbat and during breaks, and who helps students find a place when it doesn't.
Cost
Only a handful of schools publish their tuition. Where a price is published, it's on the listing with the year it applies to. For the rest, ask early, and ask what the price includes. See what the year costs and how to pay for it.
Make a shortlist and compare
- Go through the seminary list and add anything that looks possible to your shortlist. Don't overthink this round.
- Open Compare to see your shortlist side by side.
- Cut it to three or four. Most students apply to about that many.
- For each one left, talk to two students who were there in the last two years. Ask what a normal Tuesday looked like and what they'd change.
- Take our questions to ask a seminary to Israel night and to your interview.
We don't rank or review seminaries, and no school pays to be listed. Everything on a listing comes from that school's own website, with the date we checked it.
