Israel’s youngest research university, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev was founded in 1969, its purpose: to be a driving force in the development of the Negev, a desert area comprising 60% of the country. BGU was inspired by the vision of lsrael’s first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, who believed that Israel’s scientific future lay in this region. Today BGU is a vibrant center for research and teaching, with 20,000 students in five faculties – Engineering, Health, Natural Sciences, Humanities and Social Sciences, and Management; and the School of Advanced Graduate Studies. It also includes the Institutes for Desert Research, the National Institute for Biotechnology in the Negev, and the Ben-Gurion Research Center and Archives. BGU has campuses in Beer-Sheva, in Sede Boker, the desert community 50 kilometers south of Beer-Sheva, and in Eilat. In 2007 BGU took a strategic decision to establish an “Office of International Academic Affairs” (OIAA), to be responsible for coordination of mobility matters and develop all aspects of internationalisation.
In 2012, the Bologna Training Center (BTC) was established under the auspices of the Center for the Study of European Politics and Society (CSEPS), the National Jean Monnet Center in Israel. The BTC has emerged as the major knowledge center in Israel concerning the Bologna Process and provides information and training on a national basis as well as encouraging discourse concerning the process at all levels of the HE system.
The Center for Excellence in Teaching was established in 2002, one of the first such centers in Israel. The Center conducts a wide array of workshops for BGU faculty on an annual basis and is a pivotal member of the Israeli forum of teaching centers and, as such, conducts other workshops on a national scale. The center’s activities include: provision of teaching workshops for new faculty members, coaching programme for faculty members, e-learning workshops , the organization and participation of conferences on teaching excellence, as well as developing and maintaining the University student evaluation questionnaire.
The Centre for Excellence in Teaching works closely with the BTC in various activities. The BTC provides workshops and training on writing syllabi based on learning outcomes and understanding the student-centered approach to learning.
BGU will be responsible for the project’s quality assurance mechanism. The BGU team will develop the QA approach to evaluate the project’s outcomes and implement it accordingly. The QA mechanism will be based on benchmarking and impact tools to assess the Centers as well as the teaching models. The benchmarking and impact tools will be developed at the beginning of the project and the development of the CETs and teaching models will be assessed accordingly. The BGU team will also produce a mid-term assessment report as well as a final assessment report.
In addition to leading the QA, BGU will also be responsible for providing workshops and resources on the Bologna Process and student centered-approach to learning. The BGU team will participate in the development of the teaching model on internationalization and also be involved in implementing the workshop.
