When it comes to education, it concerns us all. Israel’s education system has grown Nobel Prize laureates, hi-tech entrepreneurs, leaders and cultural figures, but it also faces some significant challenges: the worrisome gaps between populations from different social backgrounds, the limited achievements in international indexes, the low budgets that make it difficult to recruit quality human resources for teaching, and the lack of learning infrastructures, suitable for the 21st century, in some of the educational institutions.

These challenges were at the heart of Yedioth Ahronoth’s and Ynet’s Education Conference in association with the Jewish National Fund, which we have developed and produced. The conference was held at ICC Jerusalem with the participation of the President of Israel Reuven Rivlin, Minister of Education Naftali Bennett, education experts from Israel and the world, school principals, teachers and students. In the conference, the burning issues of formal and unformal education were discussed, in order to realize how to lead a change in education.

The conference’s content was dynamic and diverse, combining different discussion formats and speakers from various disciplines, and creating interest for all participants. The conference also featured an exhibition of education innovations by start-up companies, entrepreneurs and students. For the exhibition, the JNF established the “JNF Café”, a site that functioned as the central networking arena.