Objectives
Tishma's mission is to offer an intensive behavioral intervention to children diagnosed with autism that will substantially improve their communication, learning and life skills, providing them with a more dignified and self-sufficient life. Our aim is to help these children, as far as is possible in each case, become integral members of wider society. Each child student receives an educational program, based on the skills and abilities each child possesses or lacks, and their progress is constantly tracked; teachers continuously record data, which is regularly evaluated by supervisors, thus maximizing the effectiveness of the programs for each child.
School Day
Each Tishma student receives a tailor-made program, delivered during 'long school days' 8AM to 5PM, Sunday to Thursday and 8AM to 12PM on Fridays, full of sessions designed to optimize the chances for children with autism to fulfill their potential. Our school year runs from September 1st through July 31st, longer than is required by the Ministry of Education, and during the August we run summer day camps. Throughout the year we also organize regular weekends away to provide respite for the parents.
Student Population
For the 2009-2010 school year Tishma has 55 students. We take on students, regardless of their social, religious or economic background, based on our evaluation of our ability to help them progress and the limited space we have available in each class. Class composition is determined by a combination of age and ability. Among our students there is a 2:1 ratio of boys to girls.
As our reputation continues to grow; scores of families with children with autism from all over the country have contacted us in the hope that their children will be able to join Tishma. There is nothing more disheartening for us than to say 'no' to a child, when they and their family would undoubtedly benefit from our intervention, but accepting all the children on our waiting list would double the size of the school, and to our great regret the limits of both space and budget make it impossible for us at this time to meet the demand for our services. Overcoming these two constraints, thus enabling us to meet the increasing demand for our services, are our most urgent priorities.
Jerusalem, the capital of the State of Israel, is one of the poorest cities in Israel, and this fact is reflected in the socio-economic make up of our student population. Until Tishma opened, Applied Behavioral Analysis in Israel was traditionally a home-based intervention, requiring a massive investment in terms of money, time and resources (such as a suitable space for the programming) that our families are simply unable to undertake. For this reason Tishma does not charge for our school based intervention. We receive State and Municipal funds in accordance with their standard special education ratio of 1 teacher and 1 assistant to 8 children. We believe that within such a framework there is very little chance of children with autism making significant progress and instead, each of our students receives an intensive tailor-made ABA based intervention. The value of this investment is clear to our students, their families and every visitor to our school, but as a consequence, and despite our best lobbying efforts, State and Municipal support of Tishma only covers around 65-70% of our total annual budget, forcing us to call upon the generosity of private foundations in Israel and abroad to cover our costs.