Students from AMIT HaOfek Technological High School’s electricity track recently got a lesson outside of their classroom as they toured a Haifa oil refinery and learned about its infrastructure and operation.
The tour, part of the school’s partnership with Taasiyeda, an Israeli nonprofit organization that promotes the development of leadership and technology skills in children, introduced the AMIT students to the refining process and the impact of oil on modern life. They heard about various manufacturing processes and about how the energy business fuels other industries.
They also went to the refinery’s state-of-the-art visitor center and watched multimedia presentations that explained everything about oil and its production process.
Most memorable was their meeting with AMIT alumnus Yakov Danilov, a senior electrical engineer at the refinery and a graduate of AMIT HaOfek in Or Akiva. He reminisced about his time at the school and about his appreciation of its principal, Miriam Shabtai, and the staff whose determination and dedication to its students led to the opening of the electricity track. Danilov went on to study electrical engineering after completing high school.
Danilov gave the students a professional explanation of how electricity and electrical systems are integrated into each part of the refinery and answered their questions.
The student tour of the Haifa oil refinery as an out-of-the-classroom learning experience underscores many teaching methods embraced by AMIT schools. AMIT exposes its students to experiential learning by taking them out of the classrooms and into the world, presents them with good role models, and introduces them to professional possibilities.
Principal Shabtai said the tour enriched the students and opened a window to the world of electrical engineering. “It also gave them incentive to advance and succeed,” she said. “Yakov Danilov showed them that his determination as a student have paid off and he has gone far in the field. I am proud of him and of our students who go on to realize their goals.”
