Israel Scholarship Education Foundation

ISEF seeks to narrow the persistent socio-economic gaps in israeli society, by educating and empowering the bright sons and daughters of Israel's many immigrant communities in the periphery. Education is the means to an end: to enable thousands of capable Israelis, who lack only financial capacity, to realize their untapped potential and serve as role models for their siblings, extended families, and larger communities. By creating a large cadre of highly educated, activist graduates, ISEF seeks to promote greater equity and diversity throughout Israel's economy and society, leveling the playing field in Israel's academe, industry, government, finance, the arts, the media, and the public sector.

For bright young Israelis from the periphery, it is not enough to gain admission to a degree program; the risk of failure remains very high, as they grapple with various academic and psychological barriers to success. The “Ha'aretz" newspaper reports the overall college dropout rate in Israel is around 25%. Students who hail from poorer families and/or who are the first generation to study for a degree are the most vulnerable to dropping out without earning their degree.
Yet more than 95% of ISEF Scholars stay in school and earn their degree—an extraordinary outcome!
ISEF counters the high risk of dropout through holistic, long-term investment in human capital development. ISEF closely accompanies each of its promising young Israeli students from their BA onwards, for as long as it takes to reach to their maximum point of achievement—whether a BA, an MA, a PhD, or even a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard or Stanford. Some ISEF Scholars have enjoyed ISEF's support for a decade or more.
ISEF becomes its students' second family, nurturing and developing potential as far as individual talent and tenacity allow.

ISEF's time-tested support systems and programs:
• Teach students practical leadership skills
• Develop a strong social conscience
• Provide a peer support network on campus
• Offer emergency financial aid and academic assistance as needed
• Give students tools to be role models who help other youngsters finish high school
• Offer students security, knowing ISEF will help them all the way – from a BA to a postdoc, whether in Israel or abroad – and even help them land their first career position.

ISEF's group of 48 Ph.D. scholars spend time with ISEF's 300-plus undergraduates, encouraging them to pursue advanced degrees and giving them guidance on how to manage the demands. Their mentoring achieves results: some 30% of ISEF undergrads decide to pursue Masters and Ph.D.s after graduation.

Briefly - ISEF has 45 years of experience in this field. ISEF is the oldest organization in Israel working in this area. Decades before it became "fashionable" to acknowledge that the entrenched social, economic, and educational gaps in Israeli society were threatening the young nation's cohesiveness and even its prosperity and security, ISEF was hard at work finding "diamonds in the rough" -- young people in towns from Kiryat Shemonah to Yeruham -- financing their education -- making sure they had the support they needed to get their degrees -- offering them a seamless continuum of support so each could rise as high as talent and tenacity permitted, whether that was a BA, an MA, a PhD or even a postdoc at Harvard. ISEF has the experience, the staff, and the long-standing relationships both with Israel's institutions of higher education and with Israel's leaders regardless of party, to make change happen for the offspring of new immigrants and older immigrant groups. By educating a new generation of leaders, role models, and change-makers who can then galvanize their communities and demand greater access to housing, education, quality healthcare, and a host of other important issues, ISEF is creating real change on the ground.

7,500 alumni pursuing successful careers in a wide variety of fields. Over 50,000 at-risk youth mentored and empowered to finish their high school educations through ISEF-sponsored projects. Diversification of professionals in multiple fields (academe, research, hospitals, government, private sector, the arts). Wide public attention brought to the entrenched disparities of educational opportunity within Israeli society, thanks to public media campaigns highlighting this issue. The next phase involves a new focus on training students from the periphery in STEM disciplines, to help address the acute shortage of highly trained personnel for Israel's knowledge economy. ISEF is currently training hundreds of new students in STEM degree programs in partnership with Israel's government, which selected ISEF to run this program based on over four decades of effective work and consistent successful outcomes, year after year. Results of this STEM degree program, "Science Builds the Nation," have been astounding: in 2021, while the general attrition rate from the rigorous STEM programs at Israel's universities stood at nearly 50%, ISEF's wraparound support programs for its more than 200 STEM degree students kept the dropout rate to an astonishingly low figure - just 2%. Even more astonishing when considering these are all first-generation students from families where no one ever went to college and many never even finished high school.