Tamar Ariav

Ariav lives in Ra'anana with her husband Gadi Ariav, a professor emeritus in the Coller School of Management at Tel Aviv University. She is the mother of Yotam Ariav, a partner with Boston Consulting Group (BCG), and Inbar Ariav, an entrepreneur in the jewelry business.

Ariav was born in Haifa and finished high school in Ramat HaSharon. She served in the Israeli Air Force, where she trained pilots on a flight simulator.

Ariav holds a B.A. in Economics and Statistics from Tel Aviv University, an M.A. in Curriculum Planning from Tel Aviv University, and a Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from the University of Pennsylvania.[1]. She also holds a teaching certificate from Tel Aviv University.

Her teaching career began in 1971, as a teacher of mathematics in the Israeli public schools, and has stretched to Germany and the United States, where she led a professional consortium developing curriculum for Jewish education under the umbrella of the national Jewish Education Service of North America (JESNA). She has written papers on curriculum development, including "An Attempt to Construct a Model for Time Management of a Curriculum Development Project," co-authored with Naama Sabar.[2]

Until 2015, Ariav was the Chair of RAMA, the forum of 21 heads of colleges of education throughout Israel. She has been a member of the Council for Higher Education in Israel and has chaired academic committees, such as the Committee for Academic Management in Israeli Colleges and the Committee for New Frameworks in Teacher Education, which set professional standards for teacher education at the national level[1].

Ariav has been a visiting scholar at the University of California, Irvine (UCI)[3]. She has served on national policy committees as well as committees that grant prizes or research funding.

Ariav has been on the faculty of Beit Berl College since 1985. During her tenure there, she filled a range of roles including teaching, leadership, and management positions. Her research over the past two decades has focused primarily on teacher education policy[4]

In 1989 she headed the Department of Educational Foundations and in 1993 she established the Curriculum Planning Center which she led until 2000. In the years that followed, Ariav led a number of committees: she was the Chair of the College Academic Council until 2002, Chair of the Steering Committee of the Honors Program until 2005, and Chair of the Planning and Development Committee until 2007. Following that, she spent a year tenure as Head of the Master's Program in Curriculum and Evaluation.[5]

In 2008, Ariav was appointed President of Beit Berl College[6].

Ariav headed the college's transition from the auspices of the Ministry of Education to being the first college of education to be supervised by the Planning and Budgeting Committee of the Council of Higher Education – on the level of Israel's universities and regional colleges.

Among her major initiatives are the internationalization of the College, which now maintains over 25 global academic relationships, enhanced focus in teaching and learning, particularly with ICT, the creation of Future Learning Spaces, and increased support for research.[7]

At Beit Berl College, Ariav created the Center for the Advancement of Shared Society and the Center for Haredi Education, alongside leading the development of the Professional Development School model for clinical training. Under her presidency, the college has expanded its academic portfolio and embarked on graduate tracks for pre-service education.[8]

Ariav has stated that she is strongly committed to higher education as a vehicle for social mobility and social justice, explaining that she sees quality teacher education and development as crucial forces to improve the Israeli educational system. She also aims to help Beit Berl build a more global outlook.[9]