Cultural Capital And The Riches Of Manna: Integration Of Immigrant Scientists In Israeli Academia

The ar­tic­le de­als with tran­sna­tio­na­lism – the flow of cul­tu­ral ca­pi­tal ac­ross bor­ders. Around 16,000
scien­tists en­te­red Is­ra­el du­ring the 1990s. So­me of them joi­ned the aca­de­mic staff. This ca­se stu­dy is the first to com­pa­re bet­we­en achie­ve­ment me­a­su­res of new im­mig­rant and na­ti­ve Is­ra­e­li se­nior aca­de­mic fa­cul­ty. It is ba­sed on the ana­ly­sis of per­for­man­ce re­cords of 206 se­nior fa­cul­ty mem­bers from the Ariel Uni­ver­si­ty Cen­tre, out of whom 77 we­re born over­se­as. The stu­dy ana­ly­zes staff who re­cei­ved fi­nan­cial re­wards for ex­cel­len­ce for the three years 2006–2008, ba­sed on their ac­ti­vi­ties, as me­a­su­red by se­ve­ral cri­te­ria: ex­cel­len­ce in re­se­arch, te­aching, aca­de­mic ad­mi­nist­ra­tion, and con­tri­bu­tions to the com­mu­ni­ty.
On the who­le, the stu­dy re­ve­a­led that a lar­ger per­cen­ta­ge of im­mig­rant fa­cul­ty mem­bers vs. na­ti­ve Is­rae­lis sco­red on ex­cel­len­ce cri­te­ria. A disc­ri­mi­nant ana­ly­sis was per­for­med in or­der to exa­mi­ne to what de­gree sco­ring on va­rio­us ex­cel­len­ce cri­te­ria dis­tin­guis­hes bet­we­en im­mig­rants and na­ti­ve Is­ra­e­lis fa­culty. All in all, the re­se­arch re­ve­als that im­mig­rant scien­tists ha­ve be­co­me well in­teg­ra­ted in the ana­ly­zed ins­ti­tu­tion; their aca­de­mic con­tri­bu­tion was a ma­jor one/