Educational Outreach Activities

The MOOC ‘Basic steps in computer science and Python programing’ was developed at TAU by the late Prof. Benny Chor and myself. Since its launch in 2019 it became one of the most popular courses in the national educational digital platform www.campus.il, with over 50K learners in the last year alone. The course exposes the beauty and some fundamental ideas in CS, as well as programming basics, to a variety of populations, specifically in the social periphery in Israel.

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• https://www.facebook.com/cstau/posts/2330491380365099/

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Since there is a huge lack of computer science teachers in the country, such an online free academic course has a potential to bridge the socio-economic gaps at young age, promoting social mobility in Israel. The course takes or took part in the following outreach initiatives:

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• TAU-led Academic City program: CS teachers use the MOOC in their classrooms of 9th and 10th graders from Bat-Yam, Dimona, Beer-Sheva, and more recently Nahariya and Kseifa. Altogether in 2023 we have 261 pupils in the program. In June 2022 more than 100 middle-school pupils from these towns took the in-campus final exam to gain academic credit!

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• A recent pilot program was initiated in October 2022 by TAU for teaching computer science remotely to middle-school pupils in schools that lack CS teachers. Applying the knowledge we gathered during the COVID about effective distance teaching methods, a student from TAU teaches the course to 33 middle school pupils in Dimona in a weekly session via zoom.

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• Net@, a socio-technological youth organization uses the course to engage pupils from all religions and geographic location, with focus on the social periphery. It is currently being taught to ~60 groups all around Israel with about 900 pupils on board!

  • https://www.facebook.com/cstau/posts/4141033979310821

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• DevelopHer and high-tech-tastes initiatives provide a glimpse into computer science to young women and the general public, respectively. These programs are led by Scale-Up Velocity, a non-profit organization, affiliated with Start-Up Nation Central, which develops high-end impactful initiatives and solutions to Israeli high-tech’s human capital challenges.

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Between 2018-2020 I served as an advisor in the ADVA program for Ultra-orthodox women, led by Start-Up Nation Central. See also this publication in “The Times of Israel”.​