Helping Teachers Make the Grade: A Teacher-Training Program for Ethiopian-Israelis

Very few Ethiopian teachers are employed in the Israeli educational system: of the approximately 100 Ethiopian-Israelis with teacher's certificates, less than ten are working full time in schools. As a result, most Ethiopian-Israeli children are taught by Israeli-born educators who are unfamiliar with the unique cultural background and norms of the Ethiopian community. Further, the lack of Ethiopian-Israeli educators makes the school system remote and intimidating to many Ethiopian parents: unfamiliar with how the system works, parents are often unaware of how to better enable teachers and administrators to address their children's needs. With little formal education and poor Hebrew, they are reluctant to become involved in their children's education.

To address this need, JDC and the Center for Educational Technology have created a teacher-training program for Ethiopian-Israelis. Such teachers would naturally serve as positive role models and mentors for young members of the community. Veteran Israeli and other immigrant children and parents would view everyday examples of integration while obtaining grounds for respect of different cultural and ethnic backgrounds. For this to happen, Ethiopian-Israeli teachers must be provided with the skills and information necessary to succeed, while encouraging cooperation within the system itself. The goals of the program are to:

• Provide individual Ethiopian-Israeli teachers with an opportunity for professional employment and advancement


• Make the school environment more sensitive to the cultural norms of the Ethiopian community


• Bolster the educational achievements of Ethiopian-Israeli students


• Provide a bridge between schools and Ethiopian-born parents


• Offer Ethiopian-Israeli students a powerful role model


• Foster trained educational leadership within the Ethiopian-Israeli community


• Break down barriers between the Ethiopian and the veteran Israeli communities

The program targets trained Ethiopian teachers with the goal of obtaining classroom assignments for all by the end of the three-year training program. Training includes a full-time seven-month course for Ethiopian-Israelis who have graduated from local teacher-training colleges and universities – either recently or several years ago – as well as for teachers who received their certification in Ethiopia.

In addition, the teachers participate in seminars and field trips that fill in the gaps of their knowledge of Israeli history and culture. During their first year in the program they join groups of Israeli youth on a "March of the Living" trip to Poland where they have teaching responsibilities. Additional seminars and trips throughout Israel are held in the following years.

Participants receive a living stipend throughout the course of the study program, and in the second and third year receive paid salaries by the Ministry of Education. They also receive lap top computers at the start of training and those who successfully complete the three-year course keep the computers for their own use as they enter the Israeli school system, thus breaking the barriers and serving as role models for students and future teachers alike.

During the course of the program the teachers are given special projects to carry out in the classrooms of schools with a significant number of Ethiopian-Israeli students. They are also required to work in after-school tutoring programs two to three times a week. Upon completion of the training program, and having established a working relationship with a school and its principal, the teachers are hired as full-time classroom teachers. They continue to receive ongoing supervision from the program staff and meet once a month to exchange ideas and experiences.

The program is currently overseen by a steering committee comprised of representatives of the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Absorption, the Ethiopian community and local authorities.