Dear colleagues,

I'm happy to provide a brief update, which includes mostly good news, a little consolation during these calamitous days.

1. Student satisfaction survey. During the month of July every year we conduct a survey in which all students are invited to express their degree of satisfaction with the studies at the University (this survey is different than the one conducted at the end of each course). This year, about 7,700 students (bachelor’s and master’s degree students) responded (about 40%). The results are detailed in Table 1 (the score is a simple average of the scores students gave on each topic, on a five-point scale: 1 – not at all satisfied; 2 – low satisfaction; 3 – medium; 4 – high; 5 – very high):

1. Student satisfaction	2017/18	2018/19	2019/20	2020/21
General satisfaction with studies at the Hebrew University	3.68	3.79	3.82	3.89
Willingness to recommend a friend to study at HUJI	3.68	3.79	3.81	3.89
Satisfaction with peers at the HUJI	3.79	3.97	4.01	4.05

 

The changes from year to year are small, but the trend is significant and one can identify, cautiously, continuous improvement in the degree of student satisfaction with our course of action. The conditions this year posed particularly difficult challenges, including: operating in the shadow of the pandemic, violent incidents last May, and, in contrast, the significant increase in the number of students. Our success in continuing the trend of improvement in the degree of student satisfaction is a result of your efforts: the staff in the Student Administration Division, in the Dean of Students office, in the Secretariats at the faculties and departments, and at the marketing department; the academic faculty members; and all members of the Hebrew University community. The responses to the poll express the students' gratitude for our hard work.

Thank you to the Dean's office staff, led by Guy Harpaz (and to the academic advisers, Shaul Oreg and Lilach Sagiv), on leading the survey. We will be publishing the data pertaining to each department in the coming weeks, and this will help in the preparation of work plans in the units. As always, we look forward, not backward, and recognize that we must continue to improve.

2. Shanghai Ranking. For some reason, from among the various international rankings of academic institutions, the Shanghai Ranking is gaining media prominence. For this reason alone, and despite the index’s methodological difficulties, we were pleased that in the current ranking, which was published last week, we returned to placement among the top 100 institutions in the world, and first in Israel.

In the past (since this index began publishing, in 2003) we were ranked anywhere from 55^th place to 85^th place. Yet since 2017, our ranking in this index has dropped, and except for 2018 (when we were ranked 95^th), in the rest of the years, we were ranked below the top 100 (our exact ranking was 101, but the published index groups all institutions that rank between 101 and 150 in one group, without specifying details). This year, we returned to the top 100 institutions on this ranking, with a ranking of 90 (Table 2):

2. Shanghai Ranking	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021
HUJI	70	67	87	101-150	95	101-150	101-150	90
Weizmann	107	105	101-150	101-150	101-150	101-150	93	92
Technion	79	77	69	93	77	85	101-150	94
TAU	160	152	150-200	150-200	150-200	150-200	150-200	150-200

 

As stated, this index reflects only certain aspects in the assessment of academic quality. These aspects include: the number of Nobel and Fields Prizes awarded to the institution’s alumni and faculty members (30%); the number of faculty members included among the most cited in their field (20%); and the number of publications in the journals Nature and Science (20%) and a broader (yet selective) list of additional journals (20%); the adjustment for the number of faculty members in the institution is given a small weight (10%). The index’s contribution to the characterization of the research situation at our university is thus limited, and its effect is mainly image-based. But image is also important, for example, in attracting international graduate students, for fundraising and establishing institutional collaborations. Therefore, the improvement in our ranking is good news, and here too, thanks are due to the University’s dedicated researchers and those who support research at the university, for their excellent and very hard work.

3. Green pass. An update without any mention of COVID-19 is not yet possible. In accordance with the government decision, which took effect on August 19, 2021 (and is currently valid only until September 9), students are allowed to enter campus only by presenting a green pass (or presenting a negative result on a quick COVID-19 test – not a home test – taken up to 24 hours before presenting the test results; or upon presenting a medical certificate stating that the student cannot be vaccinated due to a medical reason). We moved up the date and have instituted an entry restriction at the University since August 12.  Our entry restriction applies to the entire University community, not just students. Moreover, we determined that the work of the University’s administrative staff is to be done in capsules, so that at any given time, only up to half of the university’s administrative staff members are physically present on campus. These precautions are intended to reduce the risk of contracting the virus.

The university community is praiseworthy for its responsible conduct. In a survey conducted by the Student Union, about 97% of the students who responded to the survey (more than 1,000 students) stated that they have a green pass. Further, according to the estimates we have, about 99% of the members of the academic and administrative staff have a green pass. In recent days, there have been isolated cases in which persons entered the campus without a green pass, and we are pursuing disciplinary actions in this regard. I wish to take this opportunity to once again thank the dedicated staff of the Security Division, which engages tirelessly in rapid and effective epidemiological investigation following each case of the presence of a confirmed COVID-19 patient on campus, as well as the difficult task of enforcing the green pass policy on campus. Thanks are also due to the university’s students in the medical fields, who volunteer to assist in the hospitals.

We have informed the students that if the hoped-for improvement in the morbidity situation does not occur, the green pass policy will continue to remain in effect with the commencement of the school year. Except in special cases, we do not intend to carry out parallel (hybrid) instruction. Thus, anyone who is not vaccinated (or does not present an immediate negative COVID-19 test result) will have to make do with viewing the lesson recordings off campus. According to the arrangement that we established in coordination with the academic staff organization (available in Hebrew here), recording of classes is subject to teacher consent. During the past academic year, over 95% of the instructors consented to having their lessons recorded and I hope that this will be the case this year as well, because it is clear to all of us that recordings make an important contribution to improving the quality of learning, and recording lessons does not harm attendance in classes (and in any case, the instructor can choose to enforce mandatory attendance in classes alongside making recordings of lessons available to students in the course). We are currently installing filming and recording systems in additional 50 classrooms, to expand the access to lesson recordings.

We continue to hope that we will overcome the pandemic soon and we will be able to return to normalcy. Wishing you good health and a pleasant summer.

Best regards, Barak