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Israeli students ranked in the bottom third of the countries surveyed by PISA 2012 in mathematical literacy, while the gap between the highest and lowest scores was the second largest in the OECD. This paper explores which variables led to disparities in mathematical literacy between different socioeconomic levels and between Israeli Arabs and Jews as well as in comparison with Australian students. Different instructional approaches that are known in the literature to have a positive impact on students' achievement are not observed in the relationship between teachers and students in Israel. In Israel, schools contribute to the perpetuation of socioeconomically driven educational inequality by using tracks that are characterised by different teaching pedagogies and different "content," with little or no upward mobility between tracks, leading to structural exclusion. By comparison, in Australia, ability tracking is less rigid and mathematical literacy far higher than in Israel. The policy implication is that either teachers must work differently in a track-based system to overcome the process of exclusion dictated by the structure itself or the system must reduce the use of tracking.

The aim of this study was to investigate attitudes of teachers towards a pedagogy of inclusion in their classroom, focusing on differences between teachers in schools with lower socioeconomic status (SES) populations and those in schools with more affluent students, and between homeroom as opposed to subject teachers. Our study population consisted of 214 teachers from Jewish secondary schools (7th through 12th grade) in Israel's state school system. The schools surveyed were classified by socioeconomic level (high, intermediate, or low). The study demonstrates that teachers in low-SES schools report more inclusive attitudes and behaviour than do teachers in high-SES schools. Another key finding was that homeroom teachers self-report greater inclusiveness than do subject teachers. This finding is very important for the Israeli high school system, since subject teachers constitute roughly 70% of its teaching personnel, whereas students engage with homeroom teachers, on average, no more than 10% of their time in school. In the context of exclusive practices, we found a lack of differentiation between various types of behavioural problems: teachers responded to aggressive or disruptive behaviour in the same manner as they would handle disengagement, truancy, or learning avoidance. Finally, with regard to the form of punishment imposed by schools, a common response encountered in this study was the withholding of remedial instruction in response to problematic behaviour.

More than 300,000 diaspora Jewish young adults and tens of thousands of their Israeli peers have participated in structured, cross-cultural encounters--"mifgashim"--in the context of an experiential education program known as Taglit-Birthright Israel. Drawing on field observations, interviews, and surveys, the formal and informal components of the encounters are described, and the meanings participants attach to the experience are analyzed. For North Americans, the encounters enable a personal and seemingly authentic experience of "the real" Israel, and make them feel welcome in the Jewish homeland. For Israelis, the encounters foster national pride, as well as identification with the transnational Jewish collective. Although program sponsors hoped the encounters would also create a forum for learning by Israeli participants about life in the Jewish diaspora, this latter goal was not typically achieved. This article explores the mechanisms by which the encounters generate identification with the homeland and the transnational Jewish collective, as well as the limitations of the encounters as a vehicle for reciprocal learning about diaspora culture and society. (Contains 10 footnotes and 4 figures.)

Studied the relative weight of personal, social, and cultural variables that explain gender differences in mathematics learning in different sectors of Israeli society. Results from 106 Jewish and 105 Arab high school students show the higher perceived achievement and mathematics self-confidence of the Arab girls. Explores reasons for the differences. (SLD)

Discusses gender differences in mathematics among Jewish and Arab youth in Israel by presenting research done in four Jewish and two Israeli Arab coeducational schools. Examines the factors that have influenced the degree to which high school students in the Jewish and Arab sectors anticipate making use of mathematically based professions in the future. (Author/ASK)

This article examines the process of ethnic identity formation among two different groups of recent immigrants to the United States: secular kibbutzborn Israelis and middle-class Haitians. While the two groups are different in a number of ways, they share an ambivalence with the identities that American society would assign to them - as Jews and blacks respectively. By contrasting these two case studies we identify the role of the |proximal host', the category to which the immigrants would be assigned following immigration. The determination of the ultimate definition of the ethnic identities of these immigrants is a result of the interaction of the conception of identity the immigrants bring with them from their countries of origin, the definitions and reactions of the proximal host group, and the overall ordering and definitions of American society. The ambivalence of both groups of immigrants towards their post-immigration identities is a result of both macro-forces determining the definition of categories and micro-forces of individual choice. In conclusion we show that because of the primacy of race in American society, Israelis are likely to face many more options in the determination of their identities, than are Haitians, although they both face a similar structural dilemma.

Israeli students ranked in the bottom third of the countries surveyed by PISA 2012 in mathematical literacy, while the gap between the highest and lowest scores was the second largest in the OECD. This paper explores which variables led to disparities in mathematical literacy between different socioeconomic levels and between Israeli Arabs and Jews as well as in comparison with Australian students. Different instructional approaches that are known in the literature to have a positive impact on students' achievement are not observed in the relationship between teachers and students in Israel. In Israel, schools contribute to the perpetuation of socioeconomically driven educational inequality by using tracks that are characterised by different teaching pedagogies and different content, with little or no upward mobility between tracks, leading to structural exclusion. By comparison, in Australia, ability tracking is less rigid and mathematical literacy far higher than in Israel. The policy implication is that either teachers must work differently in a track-based system to overcome the process of exclusion dictated by the structure itself or the system must reduce the use of tracking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a multivariate secondary analysis of the respondents of the Australian Gen08 national survey of Australian Jewry in the 18-44-year-old age group, for the evaluation of the impact of Jewish schooling, informal Jewish education, and visits to Israel on Australian Jewry. The author found that Jewish ritual practice and cognitive measures are enhanced by day schools, while Jewish community activism is primarily driven by youth movement participation and Israel visits.

Heritage tourism takes on a new meaning when conceived and implemented in the framework of a diaspora-homeland context. Trip organisers utilise heritage tourism that identifies the signifiers of national collective identity or Peoplehood and construct an experience of authenticity that supports a newly reconstructed narrative of personal and collective identity that bridges the diaspora and homeland identities. This paper examines into the differential consequences of heritage tourism on the ethnic identity of diaspora travellers from North America and the former Soviet Union to their home- land, specifically contrasting Jewish tourists from different diaspora localities making an otherwise almost identical birthright Israel trip. For both groups, Jewish ethnic identity was strengthened, particularly their emotional attachment to Israel. However, the difference between the two groups was found in the actual factors that explain this post trip attachment to Israel. The experiential component was more prominent among participants from the former Soviet Union, while among North American student participants, Jewish background as well as their higher pre-trip motivations provide an explanation for their high post-trip scores of attachment to Israel. Israel thus serves as the liminal domain of diaspora tourists, where existential authenticity and pre-trip ethnicity as latent as the latter may be, intertwine experientially to generate an expansion of the frame of individual identity of diaspora tourists in their homeland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article cites a longitudinal study of the absorption of young Russian immigrants into the Israeli kibbutz. Specifically, the study aims to know the emergent ethnicity of these immigrants. Here, the ethnic identity of the immigrants is symbolic through identification with a common origin and nationality. Furthermore, the researchers have reported a limited case study of immigrants from the former Soviet Union living on a kibbutz. These limitations derive from the restriction of the researchers' analysis to only a small section of an extraordinarily large migrant stream, namely, single young adult respondents who started their life in Israel within the kibbutz ulpan framework.