Education Policy Program
Education is Israel’s primary national infrastructure. As a primary factor in providing equal opportunities for full realization of individual abilities, it is vitally important to understand which policies work and which do not. The Education Policy Program concentrates on these issues while examining achievements, budgets, regional and ethnic characteristics, and a host of other related issues.
- Policy Program Fellows
- Chair
- Yossi Shavit
- Fellows
- Khaled Abu-Asba
- Ismail Abu-Saad
- Chaim Adler
- Shlomit Amichai
- Chana Ayalon
- Shlomo Beck
- Gila Ben Har
- Yair Berson
- Carmel Blank
- Nachum Blass
- Ofer Brandes
- Nora Cohen
- Avital Darmon
- Yigal Douchan
- Yariv Feniger
- Isaac Friedman
- Yossi Gidanian
- Josh Glazer
- Meir Kraus
- David Maagan
- Zemira Mevarech
- David Nevo
- Sephi Pumpian
- Dmitri Romanov
- Analia Schlosser
- Rita Sever
- Yehudit Shalvi
- Kemal Shufniyah
- Sidney Strauss
- Rami Sulimani
- Zvi Yanai
- Miri Yemini
- Michael Yodovitsky
- Noam Zussman
Developments in Israel’s Education System
The chapter discusses developments in Israel’s education system from preschool to the end of secondary school education with an emphasis on demographic changes in the system and its components. Two prominent features are the rising share of enrollment in unofficial recognized Arab schools and the growing trend of extending kindergarten by an extra year for six-year-olds. Comparisons of teachers’ pay and work conditions in Israel and other countries are based on the OECD publication “Education at a Glance.” Once data from Israel are properly adjusted and corrected, Israeli teachers fare much better comparatively than is commonly thought. The chapter’s final section discusses pupils’ achievements on the matriculation exams. Although the percentage of pupils receiving a matriculation certificate has remained stable in recent years, when viewed along with the growing number of ultra-Orthodox and East Jerusalem Arab pupils who opt out of these exams, there is an increase in 12th grade enrollment rates and in the percentage of pupils taking the matriculation exams, earning the matriculation certificate, and meeting higher education admission requirements.
This appears as a chapter in the Center’s annual publication State of the Nation Report – Society, Economy and Policy 2010.