COLEGIO DELA PURISIMA CONCEPCION

School of the Arcdiocese of Capiz

School of Graduate Studies
Comparative Education

EDUC 212

Gaycebel Delos Santos Dr. Evangeline Ybanez

Krizzel C. Catamin Professor
Gerryl
Reporters
EDUCATION IN ISRAEL

SCHOOL SYSTEM
Education in Israel is a precious legacy. Following the tradition of past generations,
education continues to be a fundamental value and is recognized as the key to the
future. The educational system aims to prepare children to become responsible
members of a democratic, pluralistic society in which people from different ethnic,
religious, cultural and political backgrounds coexist. It is based on Jewish values,
love of the land, and the principles of liberty and tolerance. It seeks to impart a high
level of knowledge, with an emphasis on scientific and technological skills essential
for the countrys continued development.
Primary Education

Israel is a complex society with tensions between state and religion, and the cultural
rights of jews and arabs. Notwithstanding this, the state curriculum is standardized
by the ministry of education and culture who allow few exceptions. The academic
year runs from september through to july 6 days a week, and the teaching medium
is either Arabic or Hebrew. Education is compulsory and free (although some
materials must be bought).
Two years of nursery school are prescribed by law, as are the 8 years of primary
education that follow. Here pupils learn the academic basics, as they prepare
perhaps for the form of secondary education they may follow.

Secondary Education
Four years of secondary education follow, all of which are free although only the
first two are compulsory. Academic high schools prepare students for university,
while comprehensive high schools provide a combination of academic and
vocational training.

Vocational Education
Vocational high schools either prepare students for practical careers, or provide the
grounding for technical tertiary study for example in engineering and science. They
are well-equipped and are feeders to the nations industrial strength.

Tertiary Education
Israel EducationThere are seven Israeli universities for which students must pass the
bagrutentrance examination to enter. Other post-secondary institutions provide
teaching and nursing training, as well as preparation for other technical and semi-
professional careers.

The nations oldest university is the Israel Institute of Technology, which has
educated 3 generations since being founded in 1924. It offers degrees in science
and engineering, and architecture, industrial management, medicine and technical
education too.

Education for Exceptional Children

Gifted children, who rank in the top three percent of their class and have passed
qualifying tests, participate in enrichment programs, ranging from full-time special
schools to extracurricular courses. A classroom for the gifted is characterized by the
level of its students and its studies, with emphasis not only on imparting knowledge
and understanding, but also on applying the concepts mastered to other disciplines.
Children in these programs learn to research and handle new material
independently.

Children with physical, mental, and learning disabilities are placed in appropriate
frameworks according to the nature of their handicap, to help them eventually
achieve maximum integration into the social and vocational life of their community.
Thus some are taken care of in special settings, while others attend regular schools
where they may be assigned to self-contained groups or to mainstream classes with
supplementary tutoring.

Youth not attending one of the above schools are subject to the Apprenticeship Law,
requiring them to study for a trade at an approved vocational school.
Apprenticeship programs are provided by the Ministry of Labor in schools affiliated
with vocational networks.
AIMS AND GOALS OF EDUCATION

The curriculum aims to teach fundamental skills, including language and numerical
concepts, to foster cognitive and creative capacities and to promote social abilities.

CURRICULUM

Most hours of the school day are devoted to compulsory academic studies. While
the subject matter to be covered is uniform throughout the system, each school
may choose from a wide range of study units and teaching materials, provided by
the Ministry of Education, which best suit the needs of its faculty and pupil
population. With the aim of enhancing pupils understanding of their society, each
year a special topic of national importance is studied in depth. Themes have
included democratic values, the Hebrew language, immigration, Jerusalem, peace
and industry.

CHALLENGES IN EDUCATION

When the State of Israel was founded (1948), a fully functioning education system
already existed, developed and maintained by the pre-state Jewish community, with
Hebrewwhich had been revived for daily speech at the end of the 19th centuryas
the language of instruction.
However, since shortly after the establishment of the state, the education system
has faced the enormous challenge of integrating large numbers of immigrant
children from over 70 countriessome coming with their parents, others alone
thereby fulfilling Israels raison dtre as the historic homeland of the Jewish people.

Since the beginning of the 1990s, over one million Jews from the former Soviet
Union have come to Israel, with many more still arriving each year. In two mass
movements, in 1984 and 1991, almost the entire Jewish community of Ethiopia was
brought to the country. Over the years, many Jews from the Americas and other
western countries have also settled in Israel.

In addition to meeting urgent demands for more classrooms and teachers, special
tools and methods have had to be developed to help absorb youngsters from many
cultural backgrounds into the school population.

TEACHING PROFESSIONALISM

The Educator

For many people, the educator is the key factor in education. Whether one accepts
this generalization or not, it is clear that educators play a central role in the
elaborate process of Israel education that we have described in the previous two
chapters. Indeed, our past discussions point to certain core values, aptitudes, and
tasks of an Israeli educator.

The first necessary skill set is relationship buildingthe ability to be a connector

between the student and the idea of Israel. This task is a process that encompasses
listening skills that make the student feel comfortable to speak, questioning skills
that are aimed at initiating conversation, sensitivity skills that create a comfortable
personal and group setting, and the personal trait of humility (what David Brooks
calls epistemological modesty (Brooks 1999).

A second skill set is facilitation of discussion between the student and texts which
constitute Land of Israel narratives. These texts need to be studied in a way that
makes their analysis and deconstruction communicative to the student and helps
him/her internalize their diverse meanings. This skill set requires familiarity with
core texts and the ability to guide students through a careful literal and then
interpretive reading and discussion of the positions presented in these texts. The
orientation of the educator in this instance is personalization, meaning-making, and
big ideas, and, in this instance, is less focused on halakhic, and decoding skills
(Holtz; and Levisohn 2013).

A third skill set is an approach to Jewish ritualsprayer, holidays, home observance,

grace after mealswhich, among other foci, helps the young discover the pervasive
Israeli presence in these areas of Jewish life. A core blessing in the grace after meals
refers to the rebuilding of Jerusalem. The prayer cited when the Torah scroll is
removed from the ark announces that the Torah came forth from Zion, and the
word of Lord from Jerusalem (Isaiah 2:3). At the end of a wedding ceremony, a
glass is broken by the groom as a remembrance of the fallen Temple in Jerusalem.
These rituals are both moments of piety and manifestation of the presence of Israel
in everyday Jewish life.
The fourth skill set is what we have in this chapter called culture building. The
pedagogy of culture building includes understanding and structuring of physical
space, use of music and art, literature Israeli peers, travel to Israel posters, and
regalia of Israel. This skill set is rooted in general cultural sensibility and sensitivity
which, while having specific Israeli content, has elements of the mindsets and
perspectives of a Steven Spielberg, Zubin Mehta, and Cirque du Soleil.

All of these are critical, but the key skill set of the Israel educator is actually none of
these. It is about something much deeper which is at the core. It is about the
relationship within or the landscape of the teachers inner soul. This vision belongs
to Parker Palmera shaping contemporary figure in advocating for the primacy of
the teacher in a human-focused education. Palmers life work speaks directly

The relational approach to Israel education is rooted in two educational

perspectives, sometimes regarded as contradictory, but which we regard as
complementarythe humanist and the culturalist. The humanist approach teaches
us that the person is the focus of education, and the culturalist approach teaches us
that cultures are shaping forces of who we are and what we might become. A
synergistic view of these two perspectives suggests an all-encompassing Israel
education which is nourished by a culture, while, at the same time, focused on the
person. Relational Israel education combines the learned-centered approach and the
culturalist approach to create a holistic educational practice.

CULTURAL VALUES

Israel is a complex multi-cultural society, a fact that is reflected in its sophisticated

educational system.
The multi-cultural nature of Israel's society is accommodated within the framework
of the education system. Accordingly, schools are divided into four groups: state
schools, attended by the majority of pupils; state religious schools, which emphasize
Jewish studies, tradition, and observance; Arab and Druze schools, with instruction
in Arabic and special focus on Arab and Druze history, religion, and culture; and
private schools, which operate under various religious and international auspices.
In recent years, with the growing concern of parents over the orientation of their
children's education, some new schools have been founded, which reflect the
philosophies and beliefs of specific groups of parents and educators.