Science in the service of society: the Israel National Museum of Science

Abstract

Science as a cornerstone of nation building is a guiding principle of the Israel National Museum of Science, which caters to a culturally diverse public of all ages. Nitsa Movshovitz‐Hadar is director of the museum and professor at the Technion–Israel Institute of Technology and former head of its Department of Education in Technology and Science. Since 1986, she has been academic director of the Israel National Pedagogical Center for Mathematics. For more than ten years, she was mathematics consultant to Israel Educational Television, which produced ‘DraMath’, a series of sixteen videotaped dramatic programmes in mathematics that won the 1985 Japan Prize International Contest of Educational Video Programs. Drora Kass, a psychologist by training, heads a consulting firm that assists institutions to enunciate goals, conceptualize programmes, devise strategies and raise funds. For more than thirty years she has been active in the promotion of peace between Israel and its neighbours and has won numerous awards on behalf of this work. Her previous positions include: director of Public affirs and Resource Development Division, the Technion; special consultant to the Israeli Minister of Education and Culture; and director of the US Office of the International Center for Peace in the Middle East.