New ulpana in Givat Shmuel
New ulpana in Givat ShmuelIsrael News photo: Yoni Kempinski

The AMIT Ulpana in Givat Shmuel opened its doors for the first time on Thursday with the beginning of the Israeli school year.

The AMIT Givat Shmuel Ulpana is a high-level school for the girls of Givat Shmuel and the surrounding areas that will strive to promote academic excellence and spirituality. A computerized school, the Ulpana will hold a special course for girls who wish to embark on their BA studies in the adjacent Bar Ilan University, and initial preparatory courses for this program will start this year.

“It’s a very unique ulpana that will integrate educational renewal, technological renewal and also an educational renewal in terms of a moral renewal – how it is possible to teach values with new technology,” Aharon Karish, head of the AMIT Network Headquarters, told Arutz Sheva. “It’s an ulpana that we believe will design and have an impact on the Zionist-religious education in Israel, through the girls that will come out of here and no less in the way that they will be taught and educated here.”

Karish said AMIT has invested hundreds of thousands of shekels in technological educational equipment for the Ulpana, including wireless internet connections, smart boards, projectors etc.

In the coming days, all Ulpana students will receive a laptop which will be available to them throughout the school year. The students will be able to save the lesson materials, projects and homework on the computer, in internet relay stations, so that they will be able to use their “virtual notebooks” from their home and any other computer.

The Ulpana opens its doors with three seventh grade classes. Although it is to be a computerized school, Ulpana Principal Rabbi Lior Halperin said that the school will not forsake the good old writing method.

“It is important to us that the girls know the feel of a piece of paper and write and create in a more traditional way as well, without technological interface,” he said.

Rabbi Halperin said that designing the school’s curriculum has been a highly creative process in order to “integrate high quality spiritual and academic lessons along with education towards values, contribution to the community and society. We believe that the Ulpana will strive for excellence, without compromise.”

Ayala, a student at the new school, said, "There aren’t any senior classes and I think it’s an advantage because we can be the ones that pave the way and those who establish the school. Since we’re paving the school we can decide what it will be like here."