More Pics from Akko!

Here's some more shots from our project in Akko!

In the Galilee- Great Pics!

The last couple of days have been a blur! From Jerusalem, we headed to Akko, where we toured the Old City, ate a Hummus Said (famous Hummus Place), and then spent the afternoon working with Jewish and Arab kids at the Sir Charles Clore Youth Center. The Center is right near the neighborhood where Jewish-Arab riots started this last October during Yom Kippur. We arranged a special project where the children, ages 5 1/2-10 1/2 were split into pairs, with one Jewish and one Arab, and asked to draw a picture about the "future they want to see in Akko." Take a look at what happened, it's amazing. At night, everyone on the trip had a blast staying with families in Deir el Asad, an Arab village in the Central Galilee. Today, we spent the majority of the day visiting the Golan Heights, and getting a first-hand perspective of the conflict from the northern Israeli border, and then we came to Carmiel to work with Makom BaGalil (Israeli non-profit)'s Jewish-Arab youth circus! Now, we are spending the night in Shorashim with a couple of incredible families here.

More Jerusalem!

The past two days have been incredible- everyone is really bonding as a group! Last night, we had an amazingly eerie visit to the Kotel, and were able to look and see the entire temple mount (with the Dome of the Rock and Al-Asqa mosque), and today, our friend Jay Rosen visited to tell about what it's like to live in Jerusalem--then, the students took to the streets of the Old City for a look at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, the Kotel in daylight, and some shopping at the Shuk! Photos, from Top (Biting in at Black Burger; the first reflection; Ashley at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher; Nandan and Jay discuss Jesus's tomb; Gabby, Yasmin, and Jay in the Church; Gabby and Yasmin look pensive; lunch; checking out the market; view from above the Temple area)

Arrived in Jerusalem!

So, we are now in Jerusalem- staying at Beit Shmuel. We just got back from our first event, a lunch with students at the Yad bYad (Hand in Hand) school in Jerusalem, it's Jewish-Arab mixed school, the kids were amazing! Here's a link! Hand in Hand

And some pics (above)!

Now we're off to the Machene Yehuda Market before Shabbat!

Flying into Israel!

Finally in the air, after six months of planning and preparation. It’s hard to believe it, we’re about two hours away from landing. It’s funny because for a while we thought we wouldn’t even get to this point. At first, we had accepted 15 people out of 45 applicants--but after the Gaza incursion, the economy crash, and other general problems, we came down to 6 total. But the thing is, I think we 6 are going to be just as effective as a larger group--why? Because our impact per person is greater. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t nervous however...I was worried that someone wasn’t going to show up...that I would get a phone call the last minute. But no one did. Everyone came. And now, we’re getting ready to have the time of our lives. Also, to top things off we ran into Berry Sakharof and his band, who are on our flight. He’s the equivalent of Bono or Bruce Springsteen for Israeli Music...absolutely amazing, and we hadn’t even left New York!

The War Siren

So, Israel just began its Home Front Exercise, where it is simulating various disasters that might occur during a war. These are ranging from a chemical spill, to a bombing and other attacks. The exercises began with a minute and a half long siren that could be heard all over the country. It is hard to describe the way the siren makes you feel, but all I can say is that even though everyone knew it was an exercise, it still felt like something was about to happen. It was a lot like what you might have heard or seen in old war movies. I can't imagine what it must be like during an actual attack. 

Statistics

I recently got a copy of the 2006 Education and Culture Data from the State of Israel. Some interesting statistics (all data from Statistical Abstract of Israel, 2007).  

The average years of schooling in Israel are 12.5. Jews on average have 12.8 years of schooling and Arabs have 11.1. Jews aged 25-34 have on average 14.3 years of schooling while Arabs have 11.2 years (pg. 370-372).

29.5 % of Jews reach Academic Levels of School (University) while only 12.3% of Arabs reach that level. 39.0% of Arabs do not study after Secondary School versus 25.0% of Jews (pg. 374).

Class capacity levels are similar in both the Jewish and Arab sectors, with the average amount of pupils per class in a Secondary School being 26 for Jews and 29 for Arabs (pg. 378).

The GEM (Growth and Effectiveness Measures) is a standardized test that Israeli citizens take in Grades 5 and 8 in a variety of subjects: Mother Tongue (Hebrew or Arabic), English, Mathematics, and Science and Technology). GEM Average Scores: 

Grade 5- Mother Tounge: Jews 70.2, Arabs 54.2 

English: Jews 72.3, Arabs 68.5

Mathematics: Jews 73.3, Arabs 56.5

Science and Technology: Jews 71.9, Arabs 55.6 (pgs. 386-387). 

Grade 8- Mother Tongue: Jews 65.2 (excludes religious students), Arabs 66.2

English: Jews 74.5, Arabs 48.9 

Mathematics: Jews 60.8, Arabs 44.4

Science and Technology: Jews 77.0, Arabs 58.3

On average, girls score 6.425 points higher than boys, but Arab girls score 9.75 points higher than Arab boys (pgs. 388-389). It seems from the data that an achievement gap exists between Jewish and Arab students that increases as the students age. 

More stats to follow this post. 

Teaching in Sha'ab

Recently, I began teaching English once a week at a high-school in Sha'ab. Sha'ab is an Arab village that was captured in the 1948 War that is now in the north of Israel. 

Something that some people may not know about the Israeli school system is that the schools are segregated between Jews and Arabs. So the students at the Sha'ab High School learn mostly in Arabic, which makes it sometimes difficult to teach as my Arabic is nowhere near my Hebrew, which makes for some funny moments. The interesting thing is that while Jewish students are not required to take Arabic for more than a few years, Arab students must take Hebrew until they graduate. 

Unlike Jewish students who go to the army after high school, Arab students follow a trajectory much more like students in the US who generally go to college when they are 18. It's interesting to sit with these kids, who are all around the age of 16, and talk about their futures and what they want to be when they grow up. Many of them want to be doctors or surgeons, study science, computers, which makes sense because those are some of the best ways to make a living in Israel today. IBM, Google, Intel, Yahoo, and Microsoft all have Research and Development centers in the country, specifically in Haifa, where I live. 

 

 The students I teach share a love of music, action movies, books, and surprisingly enough Enrique Inglesias. Many of them live in houses with their entire families, and many of them will probably never live any other place than Sha'ab. When I told the students the first day that I'm Jewish, many of them were surprised that I had any interest in helping them out.  But I think I have gained most of their trust over the past couple of weeks, and they seem to be more open to me the longer I work with them. 

The students are a lot of fun to work with, and as we get into some deeper and more political discussion topics in the classes, I'll be sure to post some interesting viewpoints on the blog here.