Course Overview
Course Staff

The "Preparing for Israel" course, will challenge students to think about their relationship with the major building blocks of Jewish identity. Each week, over four weeks, we will turn our attention to a different element of that identity. The four elements that we will examine will be our relationship to community, Israel, Torah and history. Students will be expected to engage with the material that will be presented to them within the framework of the week's topic and with the other students who will take part in a joint discussion. Serious and honest participation will be required from every student. The "Preparing for Israel" course will be one of a number of elements which will both serve as preparation for the year in Israel and will provide an indication for the suitability of each student for the specifics of the course that they wish to do in Israel. 

Course Overview

The purpose of the e-learning course is to start a process of reflection and thought on specific issues before the individual comes to Israel. The four elements that stand as the "building blocks" of the course - community, Torah, history and Israel- are not chosen at random. We see them as the four central factors that each of us needs to examine as we try to define for ourselves the meaning and significance of our own Jewish life. We will isolate each element in turn and invite the participant into a conversation with us and with other members of the group which will aim to help each participant clarify their own relationship with that specific element. It should be clear that we are not looking for any particular result or conclusion. We believe that in the course of the year every person will have an opportunity to research and develop his or her answers. What we are looking for is a serious consideration of the questions and an ability to seriously engage with the material and with other peoples' responses to the material.

We wish you all success on this exciting journey!

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Course Staff

Jamie Salter lives, studies, works, and plays, in jerusalem. he made aliya four years ago from london, england. his first degree in modern history is from oxford university, and he is in the middle of a masters degree in modern jewish history at hebrew university. he is also a licensed tour guide. he teaches all kinds of things connected to israel in a number of different education frameworks.

Steve Israel comes from a strong youth movement background in England. He is originally from England and came on Aliyah to kibbutz (where he spent my first eight years) in 1975. Leaving kibbutz, he came to Jerusalem where he took a Masters in Jewish history and started to leave thoughts of milking cows behind and reentered the field of informal Jewish education in which he'd been involved in his youth movement capacity prior to Aliyah. He has been there ever since. He does a lot of teaching in various frameworks - including, very centrally for me, the Machon LeMadrichei Chul, where he has been teaching for twenty years - as well as training educators in different skills. In addition he does quite a lot of writing of educational materials. Most importantly, he is married to Dena, an ex-New Yorker and together have four kids (all boys) and a very noisy house in Jerusalem.

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