Two AMIT students, Netzer Ivri from Yeshivat AMIT Kfar Ganim and Elad Layosh from AMIT Ginsburg Bar Ilan Gush Dan Jr. and Sr. High School for Boys, made it to the final round of Israel’s National Physics Olympiad, which is run in cooperation with the Education Ministry and the Maimonides Fund.
Out of 3,000 students competing to take part in the prestigious physics competition, the two boys made their way into the final round in which only 20 students—the best physics students across Israel—are taking part. The final contenders are hoping to clinch a spot on Israel’s national physics teams.
These will represent Israel at the Asian Physics Olympiad, to be held in Vietnam in the spring and the International Physics Olympiad, to take place in Portugal in the summer, joining other outstanding high school students from around the world.
Both boys are in the 12th grade at their respective schools, and both stand out for their strong mathematical and scientific abilities. Layosh has already begun studying toward his degree in electrical engineering and physics at Bar Ilan University.
Dr. Rachela Turgeman, who heads the physics program at the AMIT network, said that, “the success of AMIT students at the National Physics Olympiad attests to the excellence in physics of AMIT students, the diverse learning and research methods, and the scientific leadership of the physics community across the network.
In fact, the number of students in the AMIT network studying physics has increased, with 20% of 12th-graders now taking a bagrut in the subject, twice the number of students who did so just five years ago.
In addition, 30% of 9th-grade students in the network are studying toward a level 5 bagrut in physics.
This increased interest in the subject can be traced back to Dr. Turgeman’s community of physics teachers from across Israel, who meet once every few weeks at the network’s Gogya teacher-training center. They perform a peer review of teaching methods and share knowledge and skills related to teaching physics. They learn innovative instruction methods from one another, which they then introduce in their classrooms.
AMIT students who choose to learn physics also take part in special educational initiatives, including, for example, participating in experiments at the center for nuclear research in Yavne, which counts toward their final bagrut score in the subject.
