IV.            The Wholistic Project[i]

Components of the Project

The Wholistic Project is a program for the years 1999 to 2003, designed to raise the standards of the East Jerusalem public school system to those of West Jerusalem.  The project consists of three components: improvement of physical conditions, services development, and pedagogical development.  The physical conditions component is funded by an independent budget, and the services and pedagogical development are funded by a combined second budget.  Like the education system as a whole, moneys for the Wholistic Project flow from the Ministry of Education into the Jerusalem municipal budget.

Several objectives of the Wholistic Project address issues raised in this report.  A major component of the project is devoted to improving physical conditions.  Because of the conditions in rented facilities, the government is under what Avi Sela’a termed “tremendous pressure” to build new school buildings.[ii]   The government has responded by planning to construct 130 new classrooms a year for the five years of the project.  If accomplished, this would eliminate the problem of rented facilities and allow the system to absorb more students.

The project also addresses the lack of vocational schools.  First, additional vocational schools are to be incorporated into the high schools themselves. As previously mentioned, only Abdallah Ibn al-Hussein Boys’ High School and al-Ma’mouniyeh Girls’ High School have vocational training.  Mr. Sela’a did not specify the extent of the additional vocational training.  He did say, however, that the government will attempt to bolster the two private vocational schools in addition to constructing new public vocational schools.  To the extent that this is true, one can assume that the government improvements to public vocational schools will be insufficient to meet their needs.

The government is addressing the disparity between the skill levels of students entering high school by adding hours to the Jordanian curriculum. At the preparatory level, added hours will be devoted to Arabic, English and mathematics.  At the high school level there will be more preparation for matriculation examinations. Beginning with the 2000-2001 school year, a program that is already in Beit Safafa High School will be expanded to al-Ma’mouniyeh and al-Rashidiya High Schools.  A class will be added for 25 motivated students who have the potential to succeed in the matriculation exams with a little extra help.  In addition to extra time, the small class size will allow for small group work and special attention to individual students.  The students will remain in the class through twelfth grade.  Each year a new tenth grade class will be added.

The Wholistic Project is also aimed at science, arts and physical education.  The government plans to bring East Jerusalem students to various West Jerusalem institutions, like museums and art schools. Some of these programs bring East and West Jerusalem students together in an attempt to bridge social gaps.

To improve sciences education, the government will build new and renovate old laboratories.  A new laboratory already has been constructed for the Sawakhreh boys’ and girls’ preparatory schools.  The laboratories at Abdallah Ibn al-Hussein Boys’ High School and al-Ma’mouniyeh Girls’ High School are to be renovated (al-Ma’mouniyeh in the summer of 2000).  In addition, students who display talent in the sciences – mostly high school students, but preparatory school students as well – will be given the opportunity to study at the very high-tech Belamontry Laboratory.  Study at this facility will become part of the students’ regular schedule.  Another program has Arab science students at Hebrew University tutoring Palestinian high school students.

An intervention program is designed to improve the atmosphere in the schools.  The government contracts four different organizations to assist in improving the schools.  Each elementary school works with one of the four organizations.  The organization studies the specific problems of the school.  Then professionals in each area requiring improvement visit the school on a regular basis.  One element of the intervention program is to improve the educational environment by adding visual aids, decorating the schools, and assisting in creating a better social climate in order to diminish cases of violence and conflict.  The organizations also help develop programs to assist in Arabic, English and mathematics education and help modernize the methods of teaching and learning.  However, the intervention program is only at the elementary level.

With regards to funding, the government is preparing East Jerusalem schools for self-management.  Rather than apply to the city government for funding, principals will have their own budgets with which they can administer their schools.  By the end of the 1999-2000 academic year, all schools in West Jerusalem will be self-managed.  The government will slowly introduce self-management into East Jerusalem schools, beginning with elementary schools.  East Jerusalem schools will receive the same budgets as West Jerusalem schools.  However, the initial focus is on improving the general conditions in the schools so that self-management is feasible.

The government also will use the Wholistic Project to develop services and pedagogy.  According to Avi Sela’a, the services component is the primary objective of the project.  This portion of the project includes improving psychological services and adding hours to the Jordanian curriculum already in the Israeli curriculum.  Improving psychological services by hiring additional psychologists and counselors will help bring parity to the East and West Jerusalem systems and help decrease the East Jerusalem truancy rate.  The additional hours that are included in the Israeli system and lacking in the Jordanian curriculum serve several purposes.  For example, educators can devote extra hours to children with special needs, allowing them to remain in the regular school system and out of schools for special needs education.
 

Feasibility of Success

The Wholistic Project addresses many issues and problems in the East Jerusalem school system.  Principal Adnan D’ais, of al-Essawiyeh Boys’ School, expressed his appreciation for the efforts to modernize teaching methods and to provide students with proper learning materials.[iii]  However, its prospects for success are limited.  In Mr. Sela’a’s opinion, most success will be in added class hours and added professional staff (i.e. psychologists, instructors, inspectors).  Even he believes that the pedagogical improvements will not be dramatic.  In fact, the project is only a first step.  Its results will determine the shape of future government efforts.

Most principals and teachers with whom I spoke believe the project will fail.  They are skeptical of the proposed building of 130 new classrooms each year of the project.  Precedent suggests that nowhere near that number of classrooms will be built.  In 1999, the first year of the project, the government built only 19 classrooms.  The municipality has directed several principals in East Jerusalem to find more space to rent.  At al-Essawiyeh Boys’ School, the headmaster told me that a budget had been established to build more classrooms, and he hoped it would be implemented soon.  But, other sources there informed me that even he had been asked to search for additional buildings to rent.  Lastly, when I asked Mr. Sela’a whether the classrooms would be built as planned, he said that the government faced the problem of no zoning for public institutions in East Jerusalem.  He claimed the government must purchase land from private landowners, which would cost millions of dollars, far exceeding the budget allocation.

While Mr. Sela’a describes this problem, under the Planning and Construction Law of 1965, Israeli law allows the government to confiscate 25 to 40 percent of undeveloped land, without compensation to the landowner, for the very purpose of constructing public facilities.  For instance, in Beit Safafa[iv] several dunams of land (one dunam is approximately one fourth of an acre) have been set aside for the building of public institutions.  Map 3, obtained from the web sight for the Jerusalem Municipality, shows a zoning scheme approved by the city for the neighborhood of Beit Safafa.  All the areas colored brown are plots of land designated for public institutions.  Every neighborhood in East Jerusalem has similar maps, each with substantial areas zoned for construction of public institutions.

In a meeting with Said al-Amouri (Abu-A’zzam) the head of the Shu’fat municipal area, he showed me several plots of land on which landowners were prevented from building under the Planning and Construction Law of 1965, including one plot of land specifically designated for a school.[v]   According to (Abu-A’zzam), Shu’fat consists of 5,500 dunams of land.  Of that 5,500 dunams, the Israeli government confiscated 3,800 dunams for the building of a settlement.  The population of the settlement is approximately 6,000 people, while approximately 40,000 Palestinians live on the remaining 1,700 dunams of land, including 25,000 living in a refugee camp.  Of those 1,700 dunams, up to 40 percent of undeveloped land is subject to confiscation by the government for development of public institutions.  (Abu-A’zzam) claims that Palestinian residents in Shu’fat pay as much as NIS 300 million (US$ 75 million) annually in taxes.  “But,” he says, “in the last ten years they have built nothing – no schools, no roads, nothing of the sort.” At the same time, he claims that the settlement in Shu’fat receives some NIS 53 million (US$ 13.25 million) each year allocated for education.

These figures and Mr. Sela’a’s remarks raise questions about the Israeli government’s real intention for facilities in Palestinian neighborhoods.  Although I personally believe that the government officials responsible for The Wholistic Project are honestly concerned about the quality of education afforded Palestinian children, there is a great disparity between policy and action.

Even if East Jerusalem schools see some improvements over the next several years, without resolving inadequacies in the basic infrastructure, the government will fail to make significant progress. Without the construction of additional classrooms, the Wholistic Project cannot succeed. The atmosphere in proper school buildings will improve, and services and teaching methods may improve as well.  But the problem of rented and converted facilities will continue unabated.  There will be no space to incorporate adequate vocational training, without which discipline problems will continue.  Thus, at the end of the project, the school system will look much like it does today.

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