ORT Israel

ORT Israel (Hebrew: אורט ישראל) is a non-government organization devoted to education in Israel.

"ORT Israel" (ORT is an acronym of the Russian: Общество Ремесленного Труда, romanized: Óbchestvo Reméslenava Trudá – "Association for Vocational Crafts") is the largest educational network in Israel for science and technology education and has been operating in Israel since 1949 as a public benefit company. The network operates some 210 educational institutions including engineering colleges, middle and high schools, and one elementary school, in over 55 local authorities. Some 100,000 students attend ORT Israel schools and colleges and, to date, the network has trained some 600,000 graduates. Its students come from all sectors and populations in Israeli society.

Ort Israel began functioning in 1948, when Aharon Singalovski, Chairperson of World ORT, came to Israel. With the dramatic increase in Jewish immigration from North Africa, Europe and the Middle East, new challenges in absorption and rehabilitation emerged. Thousands of new immigrants needed to be integrated into the new society, and to this end, jobs and vocational training were needed. Many senior figures in the country supported this idea, such as Zalman Shazar, then the Minister of Education, and later to become president, Zalman Aran, later to become Minister of Education, and Mordechai Bentov, the Minister of Housing. The management of ORT rented an abandoned building in Jaffa and another one on the Street of the Prophets in Jerusalem.

The first ORT school in Israel opened in Jaffa in 1949. Its beginnings were modest, with only short courses for discharged soldiers, in order to make it easier for them to integrate into the country's economy. The school was headed by engineer Zvi Rivlin. Thus ORT Israel was founded, and this was also the beginning of technology education in the State of Israel. The school operated for seven years in extremely crowded conditions. The first courses were in welding, carpentry, sewing, weaving, radio, electricity, and typewriter repair. Hundreds of discharged soldiers and new immigrants passed through the school, studying mainly in evening classes. A new school building was opened in the 1950s in Yad Eliyahu which was named for Aharon Singalovski.

During the 1960s, the number of students doubled. This was also the case in the 1970s. The education authorities in Israel declared technological and vocational education a priority and called for more schools to be built. Between 1960 and 1975, 60 additional schools were added to the network to make a total of 80 schools. Thus, a decade later, the number of ORT students exceeded 70,000. The new schools were opened not just in the big cities, but also on kibbutzim, in development towns and yeshivas. Some were also built in Arab towns.

In 2003, Israel was World ORT's largest sphere of operation, with 90,000 students enrolled in 159 schools, colleges and institutions. In 2006, ORT Israel broke away from World ORT, which continues to work in Israel as Kadima Mada-Educating for Life. ORT Israel now raises funds in the United States through Friends of Israel Sci-Tech Schools. Kadima Mada is investing NIS16 million to upgrade technology studies in 72 Jewish and non-Jewish schools in Israel.

Since the turn of the century, the network has expanded considerably, making its main goal the cultivation of schools that define themselves as providing high-level science and technology education. ORT institutions are spread around the entire country. One in ten post-elementary students attends an ORT Israel school. Every year, some 100,000 students, youth and adults study in its institutions. The network serves the entire population of the country, both geographically and demographically, working in all the various communities: state schools (Jewish and Arab: Muslim, Christian and Druze), state-religious schools (yeshivot and ulpanot). The ORT Israel network has over 600,000 graduates, and employs 8,500 teaching and administrative staff.

Today ORT is the largest non-state network of schools in Israel. Until a few years ago ORT primarily operated trade and vocational schools. Now the focus is on the advancement of science and technology education.