Trump Master Teacher Award 2020

The Trump Master Teacher Award was established in 2012 in order to recognize excellent teaching of mathematics and the sciences in Israel’s high schools. In alignment with the foundation’s strategy, the prize committee concentrated on identifying the best teachers of the five-unit tracks, particularly those who practice student-centered clinical teaching and lead professional learning communities of teachers.

In 2019, at the threshold of a new road for the foundation in middle schools, the prize shifted towards excellence in the teaching of mathematics and the sciences in middle schools. 54 candidates submitted their nomination and the selection committee (whose members include a majority of previous winners) read the recommendations, analyzed video-recordings of classroom teaching, interviewed the finalists and chose the winner.

Ms. Magdoleen Hazran, a mathematics teacher at the Sarisa Middle School in the Druze village of Yarka, is the winner of the award in 2019. Magdoleen Hazran is a fraduate of the Weizmann Institute and is currently the mathematics department head in her school. She is frequently recording her classroom lessons with a video camera, in order to identify learning challenges among her students and to improve her response and feedback. Honorable mentions will be awarded to Ziwa Alush, a mathematics teacher at the Naomi Shemer High School in Gan Yavneh and to Ma’ayan Cohen Sabban, a science teacher at the Merhavim Regional High School.

In 2020, we intend to hold an eighth cycle of the award, and once again to dedicate it to the middle school level. As we learn from teachers with whom we interact in our work in middle schools, the selection criteria will be gradually adapted. Similar to previous cycles, a media campaign using digital media will expose the prize to the public.

* The text presented above shows the grant as approved by the Foundation Board / Grant 368