To understand the seriousness of the situation of the education system in Israel, it is worth looking at what is happening in the port of Ashdod, a port that has gained worldwide fame due to its appalling inefficiency and the huge traffic jams of ships waiting to unload goods.
There is no need for guided imagery here to see the deadly impact of workers' organizations, the culture of strikes, tenure and seniority.
According to the Ministry of Finance, inefficiency and traffic jams in ports cost the economy about NIS 40 million a day.
The dysfunction of Israeli ports generates huge fines for companies that lag behind in schedules, and these are ultimately imposed on the consumer.
Like the port, teachers' organizations are making draconian use of the powerful shelter in their hands: shutting down the education system.
Wage agreements could have provided an opportunity to raise teachers 'salaries, upgrade their status and improve teaching quality, but instead teachers' organizations are fighting to maintain the existing, rewarding seniority and pressure groups instead of quality and excellence.
The State of Israel is at the top of the OECD countries when it comes to the pay gap between veteran and young teachers, with the gap between a beginning teacher and a veteran being three times higher.
Also, to reach the maximum salary level a teacher is required to reach 35 years of seniority in the system.
One of the issues in question is layoffs.
There is no doubt that any healthy system must be able to separate from employees who do not meet the required threshold, whether at the value level or at the professional level.
In Sweden and France, the average process of dismissing a teacher, due to poor professional functioning, lasts about 50 days;
In the UK - 120 days;
And in the State of Israel - 300 days on average.
The result: in Israel, principals are almost unable to separate from teaching staff who do not meet the required threshold.
The budget of the Ministry of Education is about NIS 70 billion - second only to the budget of the Ministry of Defense, but the enormous expenses do not change the dismal results on the ground.
Israel invests in education no less than the top OECD countries, and the budget per student is higher than average, but when it comes to the test, Israel is at the bottom.
The inevitable conclusion is that taxpayer money is not invested in the right places.
I talk a lot with talented young people, in teaching and other professions.
The last thing that interests them is tenure at work.
They want to prove themselves, they believe in their abilities and want them to appreciate their efforts, to believe in them and to allow them freedom of action.
A teacher must come to class with fire in his eyes, with love for students and with enjoyment of the profession.
Young people today do not plan to pursue an entire career in the same job or profession.
The job market is becoming very dynamic, and people want to be rewarded for their work in the present, not waiting for their conditions to improve in 20 years.
It is not only the need to attract quality students to the field of teaching, but also the ability to transfer outstanding employees from other professions to teaching, without having to receive a first-year salary like today because they are not recognized by outside seniority.
And an equally important point: many are talking about the shortage of teachers, but there is an equally severe shortage of principals.
The reason for this shortage is not necessarily the salary, but mainly the intolerable gap between the heavy responsibility that rests on the shoulders of the managers and the little authority given to them, and in particular in the field of personnel management.
A principal cannot be expected to fulfill his dreams without having control over the teaching power that is subordinate to him.
I believe that empowering principals to recruit, reward and fire if necessary, opening up the possibility of personal contracts, and finally giving parents a choice between educational frameworks - all of these together can freeze the system, attract quality staff for management and teaching, and change the difficult atmosphere in the system. Sees another as her enemy instead of a partner.
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