Abrahami Israeli, from the Department of Software and Information Systems and Orli Weiser, from the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management are two of this year's winners of the President of Israel's Scholarship for scientific excellence and innovation.
The President's Office operates a fund to promote scientific excellence and innovation in order to encourage quality academic research and training. The prestigious scholarship is awarded once a year to outstanding doctoral candidates whose research focuses on a scientific field chosen by the President.
Last year, the subject was “Authority, Sovereignty and Peace", while this year the scholarships were awarded to doctoral candidates whose work deals with “Sovereignty, Territory and Democracy in the Digital Age".
Avrahami Israeli’s research is carried out in BGU’s Natural Language Processing and Social
Dynamics lab (NASLAB). His doctorate, under the supervision of Dr. Oren Tsur, combines
natural language processing (NLP) and an analysis of online communities in
order to characterize the behaviors (conflicts, collaborations, recruitments)
of multiple communities using social networks.
Orli Weiser's research deals with skills in data analysis as a tool for citizen empowerment. The research will help in understanding the needs, abilities, expertise of those who are not data analysis experts, and the way they act. Amongst other things, it will contribute to better preparation before establishing a base whose purpose is to encourage objective democratic dialogue. The implementation of the research outcomes should allow the media users to use technological information and communication in a more productive way.
The research was carried out under the supervision of Prof. Gilad Ravid from the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management at BGU and Prof. Yoram Kalman from the Department of Management at the Open University, in collaboration with the Open University's Open Media and Information Lab (OMI Lab).
An additional 10 doctoral candidates from other Israeli institutions were also awarded the prestigious scholarship of NIS 150,000.
