BGU Pilot Course Teaches Hebrew to Bedouin Students
BGU Pilot Course Teaches Hebrew to Bedouin Students
January 15, 2025
Negev Development & Community Programs, Social Sciences & Humanities
Students at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Sign marquis gathering spot.
ISRAEL21c – Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) pairs up Jewish students with Bedouin high schoolers to help them enter academia and achieve inclusion in Israeli society.
Malka Shacham, BGU Diversity and Inclusion Officer, lecturer and researcher, tells ISRAEL21c “Recently, I was contacted by a Bedouin guy from the Negev who really wanted to get accepted into engineering studies.”
“He had high math and psychometric test scores, but seven points on the Hebrew proficiency test separated him from the minimum threshold for admission to the university. We tried, but ultimately couldn’t help him,” says Shacham.
The result of her efforts was a unique academic course that connects BGU students from department of humanities and social sciences to highschoolers in Bedouin cities and villages around Beersheva, where the university is located.
The course was initiated last year as a pilot for less than a semester, with only 20 students. This academic year, however, the course was extended to run the entire academic year, allowing for up to 50 university students to participate.
She notes that language is “much more than grammar and words,” adding that it has the power to build bridges between diverse sectors and “create camaraderie and shared life.”
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