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An empirical study of the aspirations of Israeli Arab high school students shows that in comparison with the low educational and occupational attainments of their predecessors, Israeli Arab high school students hold unrealistic, highly optimistic views regarding their future educational and occupational destinations, irrespective of their social origins. These findings contradict extant sociological perspectives, which view the gap between aspirations and destinations as improbable, and to the extent that this gap exists, as an expression of naiveté, ignorance, or non-rationality. The puzzling gaps between aspirations and destinations among Israeli Arab adolescents led to a new model of the production of minority aspirations. This model suggests that high aspirations among minority youth are produced by converging expectations of local community leaders, school personnel, and parents, who actively heat up future aspirations amongst young cohorts. The paper concludes with proposals for comparative studies of minority aspirations in different societies.

The aim of the current study was to explore emotional closeness and emotional distance between Arab teachers who teach in the Jewish State Educational System and their Jewish counterparts in the school.

The research used semi-structured interviews with 16 Arab and Jewish teachers in Israel.

The authors identified patterns of emotional closeness and emotional distance among Arab and Jewish teachers, perception gaps among Jewish and Arab teachers and the factors affecting emotional closeness/distance among them. Empirical and practical implications are suggested.

The study sheds light on the emotional aspects of multicultural educational teams and workplaces and increases our understanding of the complexity of teacher emotion in multi-ethnic and multi-religious staffrooms.

The research aimed to clarify how supervisors in the Arab education system act to close the achievement gaps and to introduce learning programs that can empower students and improve their achievements. Qualitative research employed in-depth interviews with supervisors in the Arab education system, which constitutes a substantial element of the schools’ governance. The research attempted to answer the following questions: (1) Which steps do education administrators in the Arab education system take to reduce students’ underachievement, widen circles of cooperation and empower change agents during crises that deepen achievement gaps between Arab and Jewish students? (2) Do Arab school supervisors understand their interplay with government policies as empowering or disempowering them to improve students’ achievements and ensure the curriculum’s cultural relevance? (3) To what extent do the supervisors believe that cultural change is required to enable them to empower school communities to become societal innovators for equity, peace and renewal within existing administrative structures?

Research findings were interpreted through the lens of Turbulence Theory (Gross, 2014). Findings indicated that the supervisors strive to improve students’ achievements. A major challenge is to ensure the relevance of learning programs to the school community, while mediating between local community demands and the technocratic accountability imposed by the Ministry of Education for the implementation of its policies. This leadership is isolated in its efforts to establish fairness and education for empowerment and coexistence in a divided society. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the perceptions of parental involvement among 317 teachers in the Arab education system in Israel.

A questionnaire measured teachers’ attitudes regarding parents’ involvement in the school relating to pedagogy, resources, and control.

The findings show that Arab teachers perceive parents’ involvement as related to pedagogy and resources rather than control. In addition, the research results revealed that young teachers in terms of age, and seniority of teaching, and teachers who are not members of the management team demonstrated a stronger perception of the pedagogy and control components than did older and senior teachers and teachers who are members of the management team. However, older and senior teachers and teachers who are members of the management team had a stronger perception that parental involvement related to resources than did young teachers and teachers who are not members of the management team.

Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

The paper contributes to our understandings of the different components that affect parental involvement in developing and minority societies.

The research investigates perceptions of teachers in the Arab education system in Israel concerning the effect of their principal’s leadership and gender on their motivation. Relying on Hofstede’s cultural dimensions as an analytic tool to understand the Arab school, the purpose of this paper is to answer the following research questions: first, how do the teachers perceive the leadership style and gender of their principal and what influence do these perceptions have on their motivation? Second, what are the influences of the different dimensions of culture described by Hofstede on the teachers’ motivation?

To answer these questions, 18 teachers from different schools in the Arab education system (10 female and 8 male) were interviewed.

The research revealed three themes which describe the teachers’ perceptions of their principals’ leadership styles with consideration of the principals’ gender: the principals’ involvement and sharing of school operations and decision making with the teachers; the extent of autonomy given to teachers; and establishment of principal–teacher relationships.

The paper concludes with implications of these leadership styles for teachers’ motivation for work, and suggestions are given to improve Arab principals’ practices and thus to enhance teachers’ motivation.

This paper aims to describe patterns of experiences and perceptions of inclusion and accuracy of Arab American culture in the multicultural paradigm in schools through the voices of Arab American youth.

This study was carried out using a survey research design. Qualitative reports of experiences in school were obtained using open-ended questionnaires.

The reports were examined for themes regarding specific types of experiences and for types of inaccuracies taught about Arab culture in schools. Categories that arose for experiences included bullying/harassment, racial stereotyping and religious stereotyping of Arabs. Half of the sample reported that the culture is not represented in the multicultural paradigm in their school. Themes arising from curricular inaccuracies include misinformation involving stereotypes and biases.

Limitations include generalizability due to research design and sampling methods. Future research may use multiple methods of collecting this type of information, such as focus groups, observations and face-to-face interviews with participants.

These experiences may affect students’ sense of belonging and inclusion in their schools, which may affect academic and social growth. Strategies for school staff to implement in their schools are provided. Results may be used to inform environmental, policy and curricular reform in schools.

This study is one of the few to provide qualitative descriptions of Arab American’s experiences in the schools.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on gender and social justice (SJ) among pioneer female principals and superintendents in the Arab education system in Israel. The research questions were: what motivated these women to act for SJ? Are there common personal characteristics and educational values which characterize these women? What actions have they taken to apply SJ through their work?

Four superintendents and two principals participated in in-depth interviews, describing their careers in education and their contributions.

The findings indicate that these women were highly motivated often by their backgrounds to right social wrongs upholding values of equality and justice and empowering others to succeed. They employed leadership skills that initiate a strong desire to succeed and challenged inegalitarian rules and norms. They brought their unique feminine strengths and experience to promote social goals far beyond requirements of their official job descriptions. Hopefully their views and actions can guide the Arab education system to pedagogy that rectifies social injustice includes students and empowers teachers.

It is concluded that through their jobs these women leaders were able to initiate a policy of change and promote a new educational agenda.

The study investigated the correlation between school communication and teachers' perceptions of the school's innovative climate in the Israeli education system during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) crisis. Furthermore, this study examined the role of affective commitment and the role of sector (Arab or Jewish) in these correlations.

First, Arab and Jewish teachers studying toward their MA degree were randomly selected from 2 higher education institutes in Israel, and then other teachers were selected using the snowball method through teacher groups on the Facebook social network and WhatsApp groups (N = 383).

The findings revealed major differences between Arab and Jewish teachers. Among Arab teachers, the correlation between school communications and an innovative climate was found to be mediated through affective commitment, whereas among Jewish teachers, a direct correlation was found between the first two variables. The correlation between school communications and affective commitment was found to be stronger among Arab teachers than among Jewish teachers.

The study results confirmed that school communication and affective commitment hold a significant predictive value in school innovation and highlight the importance of affective commitment in supporting innovation. The study adds to the body of research directed at identifying antecedents to innovative climate as well as studies examining the effects of school communications on affective commitment and innovative climate in a multicultural society, both in regular and emergency situations. The findings can also provide valuable insights for culturally sensitive and relevant education policy design and management in the post-COVID-19 period.

It is widely accepted that educational leaders and teachers need to manage and regulate their emotions continually, mainly because schooling and teaching processes expose many emotions. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to trace the ways Israeli assistant principals, both Arab and Jewish, manage their emotions at work.

Based on semi-structured interviews with 15 assistant principals, it was found that they are required to manage their emotions in accordance with entrenched emotion rules in the culture and society.

Most of the Jewish female APs tend to display warmth and empathy toward teachers in order to better understand their personal needs and professional performances. In contrast, Arab APs suppressed or fabricated emotional expression in their discourse with teachers and parents, in order to maintain a professional façade and retain the internal cohesion of the school. Both groups of APs believed their emotion regulation results in higher level of harmony in the school. Empirical and practical suggestions are put forward.

The paper is original and contributes to the theoretical and practical knowledge.

This chapter examined how ethnicity and culture affect perceptions and practices of social justice leadership in Jewish and Arab schools. Four female principals’ were interviewed. Key findings revealed that the principals’ background contributed to the shaping of their awareness and commitment to implementing principles of social justice in their schools. Although these female Jewish and Arab principals have grown up and developed in the same life circles as male principals, their experiences were highly influenced by gender, ethnicity, culture, and special circumstances that position them in situations that they see as unjust. Implications are discussed.