A former Hasidic Jewish community member from north-shore Boisbriand is suing Quebec's education ministry, the department of youth protection, the local school board, and two illegal Jewish schools, claiming he received a substandard education.

Yonanan Lowen is suing for $1.2 million dollars, for damages and interest.

Lowen came to Quebec from the U.K. as a 10-year-old in 1988, and attended two schools in Boisbriand, the Yeshiva Beth Yuheda and the Oir Hachaim d'Tash rabbinical college — both are illegal and both remain in operation.

He claims those schools followed a program centered on Jewish education at the expense of the standard Quebec curriculum — and thus, they freely and intentionally violated his right to education according to Quebec law.

Worse still, says Julien-David Pelletier with the non-profit legal team Juripop which represents him, the education he was forced into made him unable to function in society.

"He doesn't know how to speak French or English," Pelletier said. "He didn't know how to count, or to read — and he didn't even know what the Fleuve St-Laurent is."

Lowen fled from his Hasidic community in 2010. A month shy of his 37th birthday, Lowen lives with his wife and children, and now works as a Jewish religious instructor in a legal school — because, Pelletier says, it's all Lowen knows how to do.

Lowen faults the Quebec education ministry for failing to take charge and shut the schools down, and Quebec's youth protection department and the Seigneurie-des-Mille-Iles school board for failing to step in an ensure he got a proper education.