MOFET International is proud to announce the launching of its online international conference website, Ivrit B'Kavvanah T'Chila - Teaching Hebrew as an Additional Language to Diverse Populations in Israel and Around the World. The online conference, to be conducted in Hebrew (Ivrit), is scheduled for May 10-11, 2015. The conference will focus on teaching Hebrew as an additional language to diverse populations in Israel and around the world, and on the challenges facing teachers, teacher educators, researchers, educators, and policy makers in the field. Researchers, educators, teacher educators and administrators are invited to submit proposals for presentations.

Human guides are great, but these Israeli apps put a wealth of information and navigation at the fingertips of DIY tourists in Holy Land. Now is the time to jump on the bandwagon as record-breaking numbers of tourists are entering Israel — 776,000 people in the first three months of 2014, three percent more than the same period in 2013.Touring Israel on a budget? Download some of these awesome applications to your smartphone to get the most out of your trip.

The two-year Minyanim program allows alumni of Taglit-Birthright or Masa in Bulgaria, Hungary, Serbia, Bosnia, Poland, The Czech Republic and Russia to continue their Jewish and Israel studies, increasing community activism in Eastern and Central Europe. Minyanim sees intellectual engagement as pivotal to Jewish values. The program ignites a love of learning as participants delve into Jewish textual sources and explore various religious streams and Jewish communities around the globe. The program teaches participants methods of fostering living, relevant Israel relationship in their local communities. There is also a focus on Jewish communal services: management, fundraising, and methodologies in informal Jewish education.

As an iCenter Masters Concentration in Israel Education Fellow (say that five times fast!), I have been tasked with the awesome responsibility of creating something – a tool or resource – that can be used in the field of Israel education. For me, Israel education must be multi vocal and overflowing with stories. Thus, my project: an Omer-lengthed blog, through which a variety of people share, bkitzur (in short), their thoughts on Israel. My guest bloggers are invited to provide content (in a variety of media forms) on one of two questions: As we move from Passover to Shavuot, the Israelites travel further away from the slavery of Egypt and toward the moment of revelation at Sinai. Where are you in that journey in relation to your thoughts/emotions/feelings about Israel? What one story do you think every American kid should learn about Israel?

Sixty-five years after its establishment, Israel remains a central feature of Jewish educational programing in North America, perhaps nowhere more ubiquitously and intensively than in Jewish day schools. Anyone visiting such schools cannot but be struck by the omnipresent physical reminders of Israel, daily messages about Israel and the many special programs convened to memorialize or celebrate developments in Israel. Given the omnipresence of Israel in so many Jewish day schools and the self-declared mission of most schools to foster an attachment to Israel, this project has sought to take the measure of Israel education by investigating the so-called inputs, outputs and outcomes of day school Israel education.

Rabbi Ari Sytner, director of Community Initiatives at Yeshiva University’s Center for the Jewish Future has designed and recently launched #EmpoweredLearning, where different YU scholars introduce profound and intriguing questions in a 10-minute video presentation, leaving viewers with sources and texts which will empower them to discover their own answers. During the week, participants can discuss the questions in an open online forum, until the following week when the presenter’s answer is revealed in three-minute video, followed by a new presenter posing a fresh set of questions. The project is centered on the Jewish holidays and it is only fitting that the first few installments are being released in the three weeks leading up to Shavuot.