Dear faculty members,

Below are a few updates on the University's activities in recent weeks, including details regarding new academic faculty members and retiring faculty members.

1. Awards and academic achievements. We offer our warm congratulations to Yemima Ben-Menahem of the Department of Philosophy (Faculty of Humanities), winner of the 2022 Israel Prize in the field of philosophy research; Raphael Mechoulam from the School of Pharmacy (Faculty of Medicine), winner of this year’s Harvey Prize; Haim Sompolinsky of ELSC, winner of the Gruber Prize in Neuroscience; Moran Yassour of the Faculty of Medicine and Haitham Amal of the School of Pharmacy, winners of the Krill Prize (Wolf Foundation); and Areej Sabbagh-Khoury of the Sociology Department (Faculty of Social Sciences), winner of the Guggenheim Prize.

By the way, the University administration has decided to improve submissions of candidates for academic awards. A University committee was established (in which the vice presidents of R&D and international affairs and the vice-rector serve), and awards coordinator (Ariela Fleger) was appointed. The award coordinator will work to encourage submissions of candidates for the various awards and assist in the preparation of application documents.

2. Newly absorbed and retiring academic faculty members. The University is continuing its growth in the number of academic staff members. In recent months, the University decided to absorb 38 new faculty members who have confirmed that they will be joining the faculty. We expect a decision on a number of additional recruits (in STEM) in the coming weeks. In the coming academic year, 47 new faculty members will begin to serve (the absorption of some of these faculty members was decided last year). Of these, only 11 are women (23%), a lower rate than usual in recent years, and only one new faculty member is Arab. We continue our efforts to promote equality and adequate representation on the faculty. Six of the new recruits are from abroad (not citizens of Israel) (12%). The names of the new recruits are listed in the appendix to this letter.

We have achieved well on the Alon Fellowships program. Under this program, the BPC provides funding of a faculty member’s salary for the first three years of employment at the University, as well as a personal research grant. The winners are selected on the basis of academic excellence. The winners this year from the Hebrew University are: Anat Talmon (Social Work); Yochanan Bigman (Business Administration); Igor Kreimerman (Humanities); Mor Nitzan (Computer Science and Physics); Yuval Peled (Mathematics and Computer Sciences); Raphael Benhamou (Pharmacy); and Adi Pick (Applied Physics). In addition, Safi Shams (Sociology and PEP) won a Maof Fellowship.

In the Alon Fellowships program, out of the 25 scholarships awarded to researchers from all institutions, Hebrew University researchers received 7 scholarships (28%) (the winning rate among the applicants that we submitted is 44%). After two less successful years, the number of winners and the winning rate returned to the high level that we obtained in the past (Table 1). This is an expression of the high quality of our recruits.

During the current school year, 31 faculty members from the regular academic track are retiring. These faculty members, most of whom have served at the University for over thirty years, are world-renowned researchers, among the best researchers in their field, who have made a crucial contribution to advancing science and establishing our University as an excellent institutions to be a part of. Thank you to these researchers for your excellent leadership of the University and best wishes for continued enjoyment of intellectual activity. The University encourages retirees to continue teaching and research activities.

The net increase in the regular of faculty members at the University has been ongoing for six years, and this contributes greatly to the University’s growth (Table 2; the number of faculty members each year does not include those who are on leave, but it does include those on sabbatical; The numbers are according to full time positions):

The University operates according to a ten-year absorption program, in which the allocation of absorption to each faculty is known in advance for the next decade. This allows for the advancement or postponement of staffing positions, depending on the available candidates each year. In the last two years, there has been a delay in the absorption of new researchers in some of the units in the experimental sciences, due to a temporary shortage in research laboratories. Extensive construction plans are expected to allow for an increase in the number of faculty members absorbed in these areas as well. In about three years, we are expected to reach the steady-state number of faculty members: the current target is about 500 senior academic staff members in the Humanities and Social Sciences and about 580 in STEM (Table 3).

3. Board of Trustees events. The 85^th Board of Trustees events will take place June 12-15, 2022. The detailed program is available here. Members of the HUJI administrative and academic staff are cordially invited to participate in the events, which are designed to strengthen the connection with the University's friends in Israel and around the world, and to report on the University’s activities.

As part of the BOG events, a doctoral degree ceremony (the Convocation) will be held on Monday, June 13, at 5:30 PM at the Amphitheater on Mount Scopus. We ask that the academic units hold a short meeting before the ceremony, for the degree recipients and their families, the doctoral advisors, and the unit’s research students and faculty members. At this gathering, the advisors and graduates will be given the opportunity to say congratulations and thank you. We suggest that the academic units hold these meetings on Mount Scopus, shortly before the beginning of the degree conferral ceremony.

4. Publication of open access articles. We are working to encourage the publication of articles in a format that is accessible to the general public, not limited to those who pay to read the articles. We are carrying out these efforts on two levels simultaneously: one, is by accelerating negotiations with publishers on expanding existing agreements so that they include not only the right to read articles, but also to publish open access articles. As I have already reported, with the help of the Inter-University Computation Center, we have already reached such agreements with a number of publishers (the full list is available here). Under these agreements, the possibility of free accessible publication is automatically given upon indication of affiliation with the Hebrew University. We estimate that we will soon reach such agreements with two other major publishers. This involves increasing the fee the University pays publishers, to allow researchers to reallocate funding resources to other purposes. In addition, as of October 1, 2022, the University will participate in financing the cost of publication in the journals with which such an agreement has not been reached. In the first phase, the funding will be a subsidy of half of the publication fees in journals that are ranked in the top quartile (Q1). The publication fee reimbursement will be made through the HUJI Library Authority, which will soon publicize how to apply for the reimbursement. After a trial period of a few weeks, as soon as it becomes clear that the amount allocated to the project is sufficient to fund a larger percentage of the publication cost, we will update the subsidy percentage.

Many journals are now published in a "hybrid" format, where one can choose whether to publish the article so that it is accessible (OA) or limited to paid reading. Our unequivocal recommendation is to prefer publishing in an open access format. This is certainly the case when open access publication is a requirement of the entity that participated in the research funding, but it is better to  publish in the open access format even when there is no such requirement. A study conducted by the Library Authority's staff and our International Rankings Committee (chaired by the Vice President for Internationalism) found that the average number of citations of an article published in an open access format is significantly greater than for an article published in an inaccessible (paid-reading) format. Here are the data relating to the publications of Hebrew University researchers from 2015 to 2021, in the journals included in the Scopus database (Table 4):

As stated, we estimate that within a few months, Hebrew University researchers will be able to publish open access articles completely free of charge, or at a significantly reduced fee in most journals. By the way, another study, which examined all of the publications of Hebrew University researchers in the Humanities over the last ten years (about 6,000 articles), found a huge gap between the average number of citations of an article published in a journal (2.7 citations per article) and the number of citations of an article published in an edited book (0.7 citations).

 

5. Students. The demand for admission to undergraduate studies at the University continues to be very high, and continues to rise from year to year. Due to the fact that the number of students we are allowed to accept is set by the PBC, we are forced to reject a very large number of candidates who meet admission thresholds. Over the past two years, we have had to raise the admission thresholds in about 30 out of 100 undergraduate degree departments, and registration for many departments closed just a few weeks after the commencement of the registration period. We welcome the continued increase in demand to study at the Hebrew University, and this is largely a result of the excellence of the University’s academic and administrative staff. At the same time, this situation, where we are unable to meet the demand to study with us, is not optimal. We are committed to doing our part to reduce inequality in Israeli society and continuing to raise the admission thresholds may harm the goal of ensuring diversity among the student body. We are continuing our efforts to attain an increase in the student quota set by the BBC (as you will recall, this is a policy that reflects inequality between the Hebrew University and Tel Aviv University, two institutions with a similar number of faculty members and a similar mix of academic disciplines available to study, yet the quota allocated to the Hebrew University is about 19,300 undergraduate and graduate students, while the quota allocated to Tel Aviv University is about 24,000 students). At the same time, we are looking at ways to change the admission format for departments in high demand, so that instead of admission according to registration date, a several week-long registration period will be set, and at the end this period, we will select the students admitted to the requested departments from among all applicants.

One aspect we have not yet succeeded in is increasing the number of graduate students, especially for a research master’s degree. The growth in this area is only moderate. We continue to increase the number of scholarships offered to students (in the coming academic year, funding from the University budget will be provided to about 250 master’s degree students in the STEM; as well as to 350 doctoral students in the STEM, and to 250 doctoral students in the Humanities and Social Sciences).  The academic units have been instructed to focus efforts on improving curricula and the quality of training. We are also working to establish a school for advanced studies, first in the STEM, that will coordinate activities on this topic.

Ahead of the exam period, I reiterate my strong recommendation to avoid "multiple-choice exams," and any exam that is mainly about memorizing information, as much as possible. We encourage you to give preference to “open-ended” exams that encourage thinking. We recommended highly that you have students solve questions that appeared on previous exams, during classes, as a means of ensuring good understanding of the material, and to encourage learning in groups.

Finally, we are working to maintain a good atmosphere on campus. Security tensions are worrying, and some are calling us to restrict freedom of expression. While acting firmly against any manifestation of violence or a threat to resort to violence, we continue to uphold an attitude that expresses tolerance towards expression, even if such expression is outrageous and annoying. Hopefully, we will be able to continue in this way. As usual, we welcome your comments or suggestions on any subject.

Sincerely,

Barak

 

 

נספח: נקלטים ופורשים תשפ"ב-תשפ"ג

מסלול אקדמי רגיל, נקלטים

מדעים עיוניים

שם	יחידה אקדמית	החלטה בתשפ"ב	תחילת כהונה בתשפ"ג
מייקל וולפוביץ	משפטים, קרימינולוגיה	-	1
אורית מלכה	משפטים (עם מדעי הרוח)	-	⅓
ילנה צ'צקו	משפטים	1	-
אוהד גילבר	עבודה סוציאלית	1	1
אביגל גבירץ	עבודה סוציאלית (פמ"ה)	1	1
יונתן גבירץ	עבודה סוציאלית (פמ"ה)	½	-
מאיר ברנרון	חינוך	-	1
לורן ארדרייך	חינוך	1	1
עדי שרצר	חינוך (חינוך יהודי)	1	1
אדם לפשטיין (לא סופי)	חינוך (פמ"ה)	1	1
שירה בוקצי'ן פלס	חברה, גיאוגרפיה וגלוקל	-	1
עומר סולודוך	חברה, יחב"ל	-	1
יובל טל	חברה, אירופה (עם מדעי הרוח)	-	½
סאפי שאמס	חברה, סוציולוגיה ו-פכ"מ	-	1
אלכסיי חזנוב	חברה, כלכלה	1	1
גל לצרוס	חברה, פסיכולוגיה	1	1
ערן פוליצר	חברה, מדיניות ציבורית	1	-
נעם זיגלמן	חברה, פסיכולוגיה (עם קוגניציה)	½	½
בלייק הלינן	חברה, תקשורת	1	1
טריסטאן קלינגהופר	חברה, מדע המדינה ופורום אירופה	1	1
עודד נעמן	רוח, פילוסופיה [מרכז לאתיקה]	-	1
יובל טל	רוח, לימודים רומניים (ומדעי החברה)	-	½
ענת ארזי	קוגניציה (ורפואה)	-	½
נעם זיגלמן	חברה, קוגניציה (עם פסיכולוגיה)	½	½
אורית מלכה	רוח, תלמוד (עם משפטים)	-	⅔
סטפן שורש	רוח, מקרא (פמ"ה)	1	1
מיכה לזרוס	רוח, ספרות אנגלית	1	1
כרמה בן יוחנן	רוח, דתות	1	1
דוד גדג'	רוח, היסטוריה של עם ישראל	1	1
עודד ארז	רוח, מוסיקולוגיה	1	1
נעם גל	רוח, תולדות האמנות (כבר היה ½)	½	½
יוחנן ביגמן	מינהל עסקים	-	1
מיכאל גופמן	מינהל עסקים	-	1
הילל-לי ביטון	מינהל עסקים, חשבונאות	1	1
אנטוניו קסטילאנוס	מינהל עסקים	1	-
אלה שגב	מינהל עסקים	1	1
סה"כ		21	28

 

מדעים ניסויים

שם	יחידה אקדמית	החלטה תשפ"ב	תחילת כהונה תשפ"ג
ענת ארזי	רפואה (וקוגניציה)	-	½
צבי יערי	רוקחות	1	1
גלית פיכמן	חקלאות, ביוכימיה	1	1
יותם זית	חקלאות, צמח	1	1
הילה טופוריק	חקלאות, צמח	1	1
עומר רווח	וטרינריה	1	1
ראונק באסו	אלס"ק	1	1
ערן בלכר	טבע, מדעי החיים	1	1
ליאור ינובסקי	טבע, מתמטיקה	1	1
סיון גינזבורג	טבע, פיזיקה	1	1
עפרי תלם	טבע, פיזיקה	1	1
רונן גוטסמן	טבע, כימיה	1	1
יגאל לוין	טבע, כימיה	1	-
ארבל חיים	טבע, פיזיקה יישומית	-	1
אסף הוכמן	טבע, מדעי כדור הארץ	-	1
יוסי עדי	מדעי המחשב	-	1
אמיר גלעד	מדעי המחשב	1	-
אורון סבג	מדעי המחשב	1	1
תום הופ	מדעי המחשב	1	1
עמית קליין	מדעי המחשב	1	1
אלון עדן	מדעי המחשב	1	1
סה"כ		17	18.5

 

סגל אקדמי בכיר, פורשים לגימלאות במהלך שנת 2022

 

שם		פקולטה
יוחנן	ברויאר	מדעי הרוח
רות	הכהן	מדעי הרוח
אסתר	חזון	מדעי הרוח
עודד	עיר-שי	מדעי הרוח
דוד	פישלוב	מדעי הרוח
ליובה	פרידמן	מדעי הרוח
מרים	פרנקל	מדעי הרוח
דניאל	שוורץ	מדעי הרוח
רוני	שחם	מדעי הרוח
נועה	אופנהיים	מדעי הרוח (מקביל)
דן	אבנון	מדעי החברה
מרים	גור-אריה	משפטים
דוד	וייסבורד	משפטים
סיליה	פסברג	משפטים
גור	מושיוב	מינהל עסקים
יואל	אליצור	חינוך
אהרון	דיטשר	חינוך (מקביל)
גבריאל	הורנצ'יק	חינוך
ג'וליה	רסניק	חינוך
גוני	טישלר	תלמידי חו"ל (מקביל)
קרן	נוימן	תלמידי חו"ל (מקביל)
מירה	שמאלי	תלמידי חו"ל (מקביל)
צח	אדם	חקלאות
יונתן	אלקינד	חקלאות
רוני	וולך	חקלאות
שמואל	וולף	חקלאות
עליזה	פליישר	חקלאות
רם	רייפן	חקלאות
ברטה	שוורץ	חקלאות
אהרון	אגרנט	מדעי הטבע
אהרון	אורן	מדעי הטבע
ברוך	מאירסון	מדעי הטבע
גיל	שהם	מדעי הטבע
אורנה	אמסטר-חודר	רפואה
עפרי	פינס	רפואה
אמנון	הופמן	רוקחות