The school year opened smoothly throughout the country, with only a handful of schools on strike because of local disputes or technical problems. As has become tradition, leading officials toured various schools and wished the students a successful year.
President Shimon Peres and Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupoliansky visited two schools in Jerusalem - a religious school and an Arab one. The Israeli flag hanging over the latter, in Beit Tsafafa, was burned by vandals sometime over the course of the night. Peres tried to gloss over the anti-Israel act, saying, "This is the act of a small minority, but we have to relate to the majority." Lupoliansky said the vandalism was "very grave."
Peres: You Mean Peace, Right?
Peres praised the new first graders in the religious Efrata school for their behavior, advised them to study hard and listen to their teachers, and asked them, "What do you most hope for Jerusalem this year?" One child said, "That we should not be attacked any more," to which Peres countered, "You mean peace, right?" The child said yes.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Education Minister Yuli Tamir visited schools in Nazareth and Upper Nazareth. In the Tel Chai elementary school in Tel Aviv, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told the first-graders, "You are now starting something new, and I want to request of you just two things. One, give respect to your teachers; they have a lot of knowledge and they will teach you and give you tools for life. They are coming with a lot of love; give them respect so that they can give you what they have. Second, remember that you can do everything. If someone tells you that you can't do something, don't believe him."
Tamir told the Cabinet this week, "Israel's educational system is better than it appears to be." She said its scores on international tests are lower than in other western countries because of sectors such as the Bedouin, Arabs and new immigrants. "They compare us to Finland," she said, "but tell me where there are Bedouin in Finland." Tamir said that the entire Arab world has difficulty teaching reading and writing, "but in Israel we have a successful method, and Arab countries imitate us."
Religious Education Jumps
The number of students in the religious networks has increased, along with a slight drop in the students in the other Jewish frameworks. Public schools have dropped from approximately 649,500 to some 644,250, while the public religious schools shrunk by a few hundred. However, private religious schools such as Maayan (Shas) and Chinukh Atzmai (Agudat Yisrael) jumped by more than 10%, to nearly 210,000, and Talmudei Torah increased by 3,000 to over 45,000.
1% More Classes, 1% Fewer Teachers
The total number of 1,466,829 students (20,000 more than last year) will be learning in more classes than last year, but with fewer teachers. The number of classes has increased to 55,027 from 54,440 - a 1% increase - which will be taught by 129,520 teachers, down 1% from 131,849 the year before.
More Thinking
The high school matriculation exams this year will include more "thinking and comprehension" questions than before. Tamir has placed an emphasis on understanding rather than by-rote learning - arousing opposition from those who say that giving up on learning dry facts and even "the Song of the Sea [Exodus 15] by heart" encourages superficiality. "It is like building a roof before laying the ground-floor foundation," wrote commentator Dan Margalit in today's Yisrael HaYom newspaper.
In addition, in subjects such as Bible (in the public non-religious schools), history and literature (in religious and non-religious schools) and civics (in all sectors), term papers will replace part of the study requirements for the matriculation exams.
Of Israel's 4,021 schools, over 20% of them will be participating in the Education Ministry's new "New Horizon" program. More than 23,600 teachers will receive higher salaries, but will have to work longer hours - sometimes receiving less per hour than they did before.