Engineering education in israel: Situation, debate and prospects

This paper focuses on the current situation of engineering education in Israel, the debate over the ways to manage it, and the prospects that a balanced education policy can entail for socio-economic development. Two degrees in engineering, the BTech and BSc, are described. It transpired that the BTech failed to meet the expectations. From the on-going debate about the situation, the need for a balanced policy for engineering education has emerged. This policy is outlined and it is shown that it can not only improve the BTech situation, but also Israel's national innovation system by viewing ‘research’ and ‘applied’ engineers as complementary to, rather than competing with, each other. It is also suggested that this balanced policy should implement project-based instruction in the engineering curriculum, both in the BTech and BSc programmes.