On Thursday, June 10, 2021, between 15:30 and 19:00, the Alumni Forum of the TEC Center will be officially launched in a festive meeting with the participation of outstanding graduates and lecturers from the Center’s programs in recent years.
We hope that this forum will lead to long-term cooperation in the field of education in which the graduates work.
The coordinator of the forum is Dr. Manal Yazbak Abu-Ahmad.
TEC International Day has been held annually since 2008, and is attended by some 4,000 pupils, 150 teachers, and 500 students from different population sectors in Israel, as well as overseas guests. Most of the pupils participate from their own classrooms by means of the teacher’s computer, which is attached to a projector, and they can be seen and heard through the camera and microphone on the teacher’s computer. The students participate from their colleges or homes.
Description of the conference held on 18/03/20:
The 12th TEC International Day – despite the coronavirus epidemic!
“We are on the map! And we are staying on the map”, said basketball player Tal Brody. The stigmas did not defeat us, and neither will the coronavirus!
TEC Center at MOFET Institute was way ahead of its time, employing distance learning as far back as fifteen years ago! Now, after patting ourselves on the back, we can tell you that we held, for the twelfth time, a study day on multicultural collaborative online learning. It was the only conference to be held during this period, and it received considerable attention in Israel and around the world. The subject of this year’s conference was: “From Exclusion to Inclusion”.
It began with greetings from the three founders of the program, Dr. Miri Shonfeld, Dr. Asmaa N. Ganayem, and Dr. Elaine Hoter: “The corona era shows us that we are all equal. The coronavirus does not distinguish between cultures or religions. Noah Harari says that we will only defeat the coronavirus if we collaborate, because viruses don’t know how to. If we collaborate, transfer information to each other, and treat all people as equal, we shall succeed and overcome. The vision of TEC Center is that every pupil in Israel will experience a year online with pupils from other cultures in Israel, and understand that we are all equal” – words to live by in any situation, certainly in the present time.
The morning was devoted to a diverse range of activities for the pupils. Due to the current situation, we opened the conference to all children in Israel, not only TEC4Schools pupils, so that children at home under lockdown can spend the day participating in fun, multicultural learning activities. All the activities were simultaneously translated into Arabic.
The activities included an online quiz on places in Israel, joint creative activity, and singing and dancing the TEC anthem. We unveiled a collage created by the pupils in the program that shows class photographs, and clicking on an image reveals the class’s location on a map of Israel. Additionally, the children posted photos of themselves in their homes, and wrote about their feelings – you’re welcome to click and view. The children “walked” around an interactive Escape Room, which utilizes map-reading skills.
The afternoon and evening were devoted to fascinating lectures on multicultural topics. We learned about the pedagogy of abundance, we were introduced to a MOOC engaging with cultural diversity in virtual worlds, and discussed important issues such as exclusion and inclusion on the web, and more.
Minister Gila Gamliel addressed the conference attendees, and stated how important it was for her to participate despite these challenging days, as she is on her way to a command center. She noted the importance of distance learning while the children are at home, and of the message to citizens, that work and other things can be performed remotely.a
