Based on a conversation with a member of the Noar HaOved Bogrim.
The saying ‘It takes money to make money’ seems just as true in the realm of fundraising as it does in business. Without building awareness, the needy just don’t exist. Getting their message across requires two kinds of currency – cash and clout.
These days, school administrators have become marketers; consumed with dialing for dollars and romancing donors. And the donors want to get behind feel-good projects they can identify with. Wealthier communities, especially those with connections in the USA, are acquiring the support they need for pet school projects. It’s not that these projects aren’t worthy, they are, but what becomes of other deserving groups lacking the connections to stir up donor sentiments?
The challenge is to create an equal educational opportunity for Israel’s youth across the board, especially raising the standard in disenfranchised communities; including new immigrants, Mizrachim, Religious Jews, Women, Arabs and Druze. This must be an ongoing effort, and not simply dependant on sporadic fits and starts of donor funds for the most ‘popularized’ projects.
Once one of the most equal societies in the world, Israel is now considered one of the most unequal. It has an income gap between rich and poor that places it close to the top on the table of inequality in developed nations. Inequality is also rampant in our education system: with High School success and access to higher education directly correlated to income and ethnic background. Donor funding and other vital resources for education should be centralized and allocated in a more democratic manner to insure educational justice for all.
But this kind of social solidarity cannot survive in Israel’s current political climate. We need a government that puts a premium on education; understanding that education is the cement that binds us as a society, not simply an item on the balance sheet of government spending. The entire perception of education must be revamped in order to create a system that truly values teachers and students. Our children seem to be growing up in a shallow, counterfeit society. Only through education can we build them into contributors towards a cultural identity that espouses equality, viability and social responsibly.
Israel’s Green Movement-Meimad on education
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Israel’s Green Movement-Meimad
