The @Neta Program was established in 2003 as a unique community-social initiative by the Tapuah Non-Profit Organization, the Jewish Agency, Keren Hayesod and Cisco Systems. The programs objective is to effect a change in the course of life of young people in the geographical and social periphery of Israel, making them into a dream team of the Israeli hi-tech world. @Neta combines training youth in computers and communications, thus enabling them to gain experience in leading hi-tech companies, together with the inculcation of social values such as excellence, individual and group responsibility, leadership, pluralism, multiculturalism, democracy, and contribution and commitment to the community.

Thirty-one Net@ students completed a selective 5-day Israeli military preparatory course through the C4I corps last week. The C4I corps is a combat support corps, responsible for all areas of teleprocessing and communications in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). As the corps is one of Net@'s veteran partners with a history of recruiting Net@ graduates, the course introduced students to their future options.

The students, representing Ashkelon, Beer Sheva, Carmiel, Dimona, Eilat, Kfar Saba, Ramla, and Tel Aviv, experienced the digital combat field, worked with internationally recognized advanced technologies, and learned to write technological content for military operations.

In a moving final ceremony on the army base, two Net@ students were recognized as Outstanding Soldiers: Hagay Frid  from Ashkelon and Liav Bilya from Ashkelon and Eilat. See the group photo pasted below,  and our blog post in Hebrew. One of the Net@ participants even created a video capturing his experiences during the week.