Quietly, away from the media spotlight and the political noise, a true revolution is taking place in girls' Charedi schools. Integration is picking up pace, and as of today 22 Haredi schools around the country are becoming a part of the Education Ministry's core curriculum program for hi-tech studies.
Some Numbers
According to Education Ministry data today, just 7,349 of 10,458 Haredi schools include core curricula in their curriculum, while the overall number of Haredi students in kindergartens stands at 412,746, or 13.5% of Israeli students as a whole.
According to Education Ministry data for 2020-1, the state Haredi system (which is part of the general education system rather than the independent Haredi one) taught some 12,666 students, including 4,139 students in 164 kindergartens and 8,527 students in 60 schools. The state Haredi system has steadily grown since its establishment.
The National Plan to Increase Human Capital in Hi Tech
The Hitechlass program is part of a national program, a collaboration between the Education Ministry and Science and Technology Ministry, aimed at increasing the human capital in hi-tech based on the conclusions of the Perlmutter report, and which, which includes targets for integrating Haredim and Arabs and achieving gender equality.
The goals of the then-Innovation Minister Orit Farkash were to increase the number of hi-tech workers from the Arab community to 4,500 and 2,800 from the Haredi community by 2023, and that at least 45% of trainings would be for women. The program was made available for the Haredi community in 2022-3, with six Haredi schools adopting it unofficially. 7 schools were added the next year, and 10 the following one.
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