The "Yesharim" Program – a comprehensive initiative designed for primary schools

A 'transformation' program in elementary schools, with low achievements, in all dimensions of the Ministry of Education'Acomprehensive "revolutionary” intervention program targeting underperforming primary schools, which addresses all the evaluation criteria set by the Ministry of Education. The program enhances the school staff’s sense of self-efficacy, as well as, improves the quality of the teaching processes, . This program also allows for a continuous increase in pupil enrollment. There is evidently a reduction in school violence, and this then breaks the correlation between socio-economic status and overall achievement in literacy and numeracy.s assessment. The program strengthens the sense of competence of the school staff and improves the quality of teaching processes, while continuously increasing the number of school enrollments, reducing the level of violence in schools, and breaking the correlation between socioeconomic status and the level of achievements in verbal and quantitative literacy.

The guiding approach in the school focuses on empowering the leadership and management skills of the school principal and educational team, which enhances the professional identity that will lead to attitude and perceptual changes, thus creating a supportive learning environment for both the educational staff as well as the pupils. Grounded in trust and respect for the educational team, there is reliance on both quantitative and qualitative research data, where a tailored program is developed for each school, reflecting its unique characteristics and needs. Accordingly, at each school, a team of four professionals carry out the program: Organizational Consultant/Coach, Pedagogical/Literacy Coach, Pedagogical Trainer and Identity Empowerment Coach.

Yesharim Program – Outcome Indicators:

• The school’s language acquisition teachers successfully meet the assessment criteria to ensure the quality of the teaching processes, as well as in the areas of perceptions and attitudes.
• The teachers report a strong sense of team capability in effectively addressing complex challenges across organizational, pedagogical, and identity-related dimensions.
• The correlation between reading acquisition tasks and a child's socio-economic background has essentially been broken down, and the achievement distribution is now normalized.