Students are gearing up for a demonstration this Monday outside a scheduled Tel Aviv press conference, at which Avraham Shochat will present his committee's recommendations for reforms to Israel's higher education system.

As reported in Haaretz Wednesday, the committee is expected to recommend raising tuition some 70 percent, to NIS 14,800. Part would be due at the start of the school year, with the rest to be paid in monthly installments that could be spread over several years.

The committee will also recommend that NIS 1.5 billion in government funds be transfered to higher education, and that the budgets of higher-education institutions be increased by another billion shekels generated by the tuition hike and internal resources. The research budget would grow by some NIS 800 million.

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This Monday, Shochat will submit the complete report to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Education Minister Yuli Tamir, who appointed the committee in 2006. Its recommendations require government approval.

Following the 41-day student strike that ended in May, Olmert undertook to negotiate with the students before the government discusses the recommendations.

"In the meantime, we are waiting patiently to be summoned for talks with the prime minister," said Tomer Oved, head of the Israeli Students Organization, which represents students at the country's colleges. "We want to see the overall outline of the tuition in the official publication, but obviously we will not consent to a sweeping rise in tuition. We are ready for action, and we have the troops to take to the streets."

Other student representatives were more blunt. "As was clear from the start, the reform, which was formulated without the participation of lecturers and students, will make education less accessible to broad segments of society and will not resolve the problems from which academia is suffering," read a statement by Kibbutzim College of Education students, who are organizing Monday's protest with students from other institutions.

A spokesman for the committee, Eli Shaked, suggested waiting for Monday and not relying on incomplete newspaper reports. According to Shaked, one of the committee's main goals is to increase accessibility to higher education, so that socioeconomic status does not prevent any young person from studying wherever and whatever he chooses.