Section archive - Education & Administration

This study explores mechanisms underlying processes of educational policy formation. Previous studies have given much attention to processes of diffusion when accounting for educational policy formation. Less account has been given to the day-to-day institutional dynamics through which educational policies develop and change. Building on extensive governmental archival data, complemented with interviews and media analysis, I study the development and transformation of school violence policies in Israel.

This paper reviews the research on principalship in the Israeli educational system conducted by Israeli researchers since 2000 till 2013 (53 works) and sheds light on varied aspects of this managerial career. The major conclusion arising from this review refers to the varied, inchoate, diverse, and fragmented nature of the research on principalship in Israel, stemming, at least in part, from the very small number of researchers in the field of educational administration in this country. Thus, the research into principalship in Israel involves activities in a loosely connected array of sites of inquiry rather than a single or even coherent field of study along the lines of problem foci and clear scholarly directions that continue to exist for a long time.

Sadly, in the Jewish community, where we count and measure so much – who is a Jew; how many affiliate; how do they feel about Israel – we do not have a detailed national picture of the educators who comprise ECE and the compensation they receive for their work. Rather, we have a tiny number of community-specific studies that paint a depressingly bleak picture about how these teachers are valued and compensated. In the Denver/Boulder area for example, Jewish preschool teachers only earn about 60 percent of what kindergarten teachers earn with equivalent education. In the San Francisco Bay Area, a study conducted by the San Francisco-based Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund showed that in 2012, ECE educators at nine institutions had an average hourly salary of $20.75. In any community, this would be difficult to live on. In the Bay Area, it essentially is impossible. Other communities can point to other studies showing similar realities.

The Jewish Education Innovation Challenge (JEIC), sponsored by the Mayberg Family Foundation, is soliciting proposals to pilot innovative educational models in Jewish day schools. The objective is to identify and fund experimentation with new methodologies that foster and reward student effort, enthusiasm and proficiency. To empower educators and administrators to disrupt the status quo, JEIC awards multiple grants up to $50,000 each over two years to programs that represent a paradigm shift in Jewish education. Selected programs must be revolutionary, practical, sustainable, accountable and scalable. Last year, JEIC awarded several grants, totaling more than $130,000. The deadline for the initial Letter of Interest is December 18, 2015. In an unusually transparent grant process, finalists present their ideas at the Foundation’s annual “Innovators Retreat” on June 1st and 2nd 2016 and grant winners are announced in late June.