Professor strike hits pockets of students and universities

When Ravit started college last year, the 22-year-old chemistry and physics major knew she would have to work to fund her education at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She worked in high tech for a year and saved up some money for expenses, but was counting on funding the rest with a summer job.

But now that the strike by senior lecturers is entering its 80th day, it looks like she'll have to spend the summer in class, making up the sessions missed during the strike.

"I can't work in the summer, which I was counting on to make up the money I need," said Ravit. "I couldn't work during the semester either, because I couldn't commit to an employer, since no one knew when the strike would end." She is now considering taking a loan, which would increase her debts but at least allow her to finish her degree.

Ravit is one of many students in a similar position. Those at Haifa University are in a particularly tight spot because they had to make up classes last year due to the Second Lebanon War, making this the second summer they will have to spend hitting the books.

And the universities, too, are facing a budget shortage. The Hebrew University, Tel Aviv University, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and the Technion technology institute have all just gotten over a financial crisis that resulted from budget cuts.

The financial damage to the universities caused by the loss of the school year is estimated at NIS 3.25 billion, according to an initial report by the Council for Higher Education's planning and budgeting committee. The report, which was submitted to the Knesset Education Committee, said the universities "will not be able to shoulder [this amount] without a special budget increase," but that the budgeting committee "does not have the resources to fund such additional costs."

The report, which based its estimate on losses due to a lack of tuition money and the expenses involved in having an additional semester, said that even if classes were to resume now, the cost would still come to hundreds of millions of shekels for all the universities - again, too much for the budgeting committee to handle.

The report also predicts that academic research will be damaged because the faculty is expected to take part in seminars and conferences abroad during the summer.

The university presidents say that Sunday is the last day the schools will be able to make up for the missed hours this year, without eating into the next academic year.

If the strike continues after Sunday, "next year it will be difficult to accept the normal number of new students, as a result of a shortage of spots," said the Technion's president, Prof. Yitzhak Apeloig. He said that while it may be possible to squeeze in a few more hours of instruction for lecture-style classes, classes that involve lab work are far less flexible.

"The labs are built for a certain size class, and you need a lab table for all the students," he said. "There will be a real problem."

Apeloig said that while the strike has caused serious damage, he and the other university presidents have yet to figure out the full extent of that damage.