Voters, Parties Score Low in Education Survey

A survey released on Monday revealed that while Israelis talk about the importance of education, there is evidence that it stands lower in their order of priorities than it seems.

Almost all Israelis—98% of them—say that education is important to them, but only 8% say they are familiar with the platforms on education of the various parties running in Tuesday’s election, according to research conducted by The New Wave for TALMA, The Israel Program for Excellence in English.

Some 36% of respondents said that they “sort of” know what the education platforms of the parties are, whereas 56% admitted that they don’t know.

Only 28% said that education was even a consideration in their decision on which party to vote for.

Despite optimism from health officials concerning the continuing drop in coronavirus infection rates, 72% of respondents stated that they’re worried that children will not return to routine education in September.

In fact, education has not been an issue in the campaign, and the parties themselves did nothing to make it one.

Alon Futterman, TALMA’s director-general, pointed that, “unfortunately, we see that most of the platforms include very superficial and general references” to education.

“This is not just ‘unfortunate,’ it is a matter of national irresponsibility, which is reflected in the fact that so far only one party has nominated a candidate for the post of education minister,” added Futterman.

“Since the education portfolio is the second largest of the government’s portfolios, and the field affects millions of households, it’s time for the issue to be taken more seriously by politicians – certainly ahead of the process of healing coronavirus scars on students in the system.”