美国国家公共电台 NPR In Israel, A Push To Get More Arabs Into Management

In Israel, A Push To Get More Arabs Into Management 

play pause stop mute unmute max volume 00:0003:53repeat repeat off Update Required To play the media you will need to either update your browser¹ to a recent version or update your Flash plugin. RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST: 

About 20 percent of Israeli citizens are Palestinian-Arabs. They vote. They hold office. And they also have faced decades of discrimination. A study commissioned by Israel's president found Palestinian-Arab citizens held less than 1 percent of the mid-level or senior management jobs at the country's leading companies. NPR's Nick Schifrin reports on an effort to change that.

NICK SCHIFRIN, BYLINE²: The way 26-year-old Basel Egberiea (ph) describes it, not many people have managed to leave his small hometown in northern Israel. He's an Arab citizen of Israel who studied accounting³. He tells me that most of his school peers either lacked the confidence to leave or were blocked by discrimination.

BASEL EGBERIEA: (Through interpreter) Arabs too have dreams, have ambitions, have professional ambitions. And it is a democratic state. And there should not be any blocks for people who want to advance.

SCHIFRIN: We're talking on the 15th floor of a Tel Aviv high-rise in the offices of the global accounting firm Deloitte. Egberiea was part of a new government program called Collective Impact that helps install Arab-Israelis into management.

EGBERIEA: (Through interpreter) I'm getting a lot of professional knowledge that I would not be able to acquire in other places. I also think the doors are open to me.

SCHIFRIN: Deloitte's doors weren't necessarily closed. But they were hard to walk through. Israeli standardized⁴ tests are written from the perspective of Jewish Israelis. So Arab results average lower. And Arab students don't get as much English education.

ILAN BIRNFELD: At the moment, at least, it is very difficult to find the right management profiles within the Israeli-Arab community.

SCHIFRIN: That's Deloitte's Israel chairman and CEO, Ilan Birnfeld. He says Deloitte has begun to distinguish between talented and experienced. The company selects hardworking, ambitious Arabs and gives them the training they haven't had the opportunity to receive.

BIRNFELD: They are incurring⁵ their managerial skills within their organization from the organization and by, you know, on-the-job training.

SCHIFRIN: Program organizers hope increasing corporate⁶ diversity can help lift up Israeli-Arab communities. And they hope, at least one company at a time, to improve Jewish-Arab relations.

BIRNFELD: This is the way to really build the trust. This is the way to really build the openness to each other. And from there, I think that the Israeli society will just benefit.

SCHIFRIN: That's the goal. But Professor Dalia Fadila says that Israeli society includes widespread discrimination against Arabs. And the problems run deeper than corporate diversity.

DALIA FADILA: Trying to bring more Arabs into management positions is wonderful. However, this is not the problem. This is only a result or a symptom of the problem. The real problem goes back into the educational system.

SCHIFRIN: Fadila is a professor of Arab-Israeli society at Interdisciplinary Center University in North Tel Aviv. She says decades of neglect within the Arab-Israeli education system has led to sobering statistics. Only 12 percent of Arab high-school students matriculate to Israeli universities.

FADILA: The budgeting is much lower in Arab schools than in Jewish schools. It's separate. And it's not equal at all.

SCHIFRIN: Fadila has consulted for Israel's president, Reuven Rivlin, whose office sponsors the Collective Impact program. She says improving Arab education is the first step to creating an Israeli society that doesn't yet exist where Arabs aren't discriminated⁷ against. And they believe they can succeed.

FADILA: That, based on your excellence⁸, based on your skills, based on your achievement, you can get anywhere you want inside Israel.

SCHIFRIN: The program's administrators⁹ admit they're making small steps. Deloitte will increase the number of Arab-Israeli managers from about 15 to more than 30. New manager Basel Egberiea hopes that, one day, it won't be a news story that Deloitte had hired him. It would just be normal. Nick Schifrin, NPR News, Tel Aviv.

1 browser   

n.浏览者

参考例句：

• View edits in a web browser.在浏览器中看编辑的效果。
• I think my browser has a list of shareware links.我想在浏览器中会有一系列的共享软件链接。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 accounting   

n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表

参考例句：

• A job fell vacant in the accounting department.财会部出现了一个空缺。
• There's an accounting error in this entry.这笔账目里有差错。

4 standardized   

adj.标准化的

参考例句：

• We use standardized tests to measure scholastic achievement. 我们用标准化考试来衡量学生的学业成绩。
• The parts of an automobile are standardized. 汽车零件是标准化了的。

5 incurring   

遭受，招致，引起( incur的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Many of the world's farmers are also incurring economic deficits. 世界上许多农民还在遭受经济上的亏损。
• He spoke to the Don directly, taking a chance on incurring Michael's ill will. 他直接向老头子谈自己的意见，这显然要冒引起迈克尔反感的风险。 来自教父部分

6 corporate   

adj.共同的，全体的；公司的，企业的

参考例句：

• This is our corporate responsibility.这是我们共同的责任。
• His corporate's life will be as short as a rabbit's tail.他的公司的寿命是兔子尾巴长不了。

7 discriminated   

分别，辨别，区分( discriminate的过去式和过去分词 )； 歧视，有差别地对待

参考例句：

• His great size discriminated him from his followers. 他的宽广身材使他不同于他的部下。
• Should be a person that has second liver virus discriminated against? 一个患有乙肝病毒的人是不是就应该被人歧视？

8 excellence   

n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德

参考例句：

• His art has reached a high degree of excellence.他的艺术已达到炉火纯青的地步。
• My performance is far below excellence.我的表演离优秀还差得远呢。

9 administrators   

n.管理者( administrator的名词复数 )；有管理（或行政）才能的人；（由遗嘱检验法庭指定的）遗产管理人；奉派暂管主教教区的牧师

参考例句：

• He had administrators under him but took the crucial decisions himself. 他手下有管理人员，但重要的决策仍由他自己来做。 来自辞典例句
• Administrators have their own methods of social intercourse. 办行政的人有他们的社交方式。 来自汉英文学 - 围城