Ben-Gurion University will now grant rights and benefits to students who are the legal partners of those serving in military reserve duty. This is the first time an Israeli university has offered these benefits.
The University, which has a particularly high number of students who serve extended periods of military reserve duty, already recognizes the hardships this causes for the students and has granted them academic and other rights and benefits during the course of their studies in cooperation with the Student Association.
Recently the University’s Steering Committee announced the creation of a new program designed to assist and facilitate students whose legal partners are reservists and have at least one child, by granting them additional assistance and benefits.
"When a student is taking part in reserve duty he loses some of the semester, but the spouse is also burdened by caring for children and other tasks. They have to cope not only with their studies, but also with an increased load and family responsibilities," says Prof. Yaniv Poria who initiated the proposal.
University Rector Professor Zvi HaCohen explained, "We have quite a large number of students serving in reserve duty and there are many students who are parents and legal partners of those reservists. The University has decided to help them out and grant to the legal partners rights and assistance similar to those reservists receive designed to bridge the academic gap created during the military service."
The rights include the ability to defer exams, submit papers and learning exercises, and entitles them to additional tutoring, priority in the dormitories and scholarships, summer courses and more. Recently a similar proposal was discussed by the Knesset legislation committee.
In a study published last week by the National Union of Israeli Students (NUIS), it was revealed that BGU students are among those serving the highest number of days of reserve duty, an average of 19.2 days per year.
Uri Keidar, Head of BGU’s Student Association said, “We are not at all surprised by the data. BGU students are involved in the community in many ways and naturally a huge amount of those students take on the burden of reserve duty imposed on a small portion of Israeli society. Our students have proved, and not for the first time, that the younger generation in Israel is committed to Israeli society and to making a contribution to the state. The Student Association and the University have developed a significant number of initiatives for reservists, allowing this group of students to receive the best treatment possible while they serve their country and upon return to their studies. I hope that as many as possible public institutions will join us in showing their appreciation of reservists, the sooner the better.”
