International outreach · Flagship initiative
The Negev Bi-Literacy Initiative: Teaching Negev children to read in Hebrew and English — together, from the very beginning.
One method, two languages, starting in kindergarten. The first cohort begins in January 2027, in schools across the Negev, with our partner MindCET.
What happened in Yerucham
In spring 2026, first graders in a Yerucham elementary school began reading English two years earlier than Israeli schools normally allow. In a short pilot, during a war, every child showed growth, and some began reading independently.
They are six-year-olds in a development town in the desert. Most had never seen an English letter. Their teachers had never taught reading this way before, and they learned the method while the country was at war. Within weeks, the children were sounding out words in a language the system says they should not meet until third grade.
That is the whole idea, and it is why we are not waiting. Every year a child spends waiting is a year spent behind.
An independent evaluation will be published here when it is available.
Why it matters
Israel's reading scores are falling. In PIRLS 2021, Israel scored 510 — a 20-point fall against a global average decline of 8, leaving it 30th among OECD countries. Among Hebrew-speaking students, the drop was 28 points. The share of children reading at a high level fell by 11%; the share reading at a low level rose by 8%. Israel's Education Ministry put it plainly: reading has returned to where it stood in 2001.
None of that is because Hebrew is hard to read. Pointed Hebrew is one of the most transparent writing systems in the world — the vowel points make sound-to-symbol correspondence almost perfectly regular, far more consistent than English.
This is a method problem, not a language problem.
Israeli schools don't begin teaching children to read English until third grade. Yet English is economic infrastructure in Israel: in 2025, high-tech accounted for 18.3% of GDP and 58% of all exports. Children in the periphery absorb that delay hardest — and the research says they don't have to. Phonological awareness and decoding transfer between languages: skill built in one is skill built in the other. Two languages compound. They do not compete.
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Figures from PIRLS 2021, published by the IEA in May 2023. Hebrew-speaker and achievement-band figures via Ynet; OECD ranking via The Jerusalem Post. Economic figures from the Israel Innovation Authority's 2026 State of High-Tech report. On cross-linguistic transfer: Melby-Lervåg & Lervåg (2011), Journal of Research in Reading 34(1), 114–135.
Why the Negev, and with whom
The Negev holds the widest range of circumstances in Israel — Bedouin, Arab, Gaza-envelope, and Jewish schools across the resource spectrum — at a scale small enough to work with closely. From kibbutz schools to some of the most under-resourced Bedouin communities in the country.
Yerucham | Ramat Negev | Meitar | Tel Sheva | Neve Midbar
We work there with MindCET, an Israeli educational innovation organization based in the Negev, born out of CET. MindCET recruits the schools and is our partner on the ground; its Negev EduLAB is built to run exactly this kind of matched-school, field-measured initiative. SPARK brings the method — CAPIT Reading, a Sound-to-Print (Linguistic Phonics) curriculum, in English and Hebrew — along with the training, the coaching, and the philanthropic support that pays for it.
Public launch at Israel EdTech Week in October 2026.
The first cohort begins in January 2027 and runs through June 2027.
What a school receives
Everything a school needs to teach literacy in two languages well, for every class from kindergarten through third grade, at no cost to the school.
CAPIT Reading in Hebrew and English for every student from kindergarten through third grade, sequenced to grade level
Progress Monitor and ongoing data reporting
Virtual professional development for all K–3 teachers, delivered by the CAPIT team
Virtual implementation coaching through June
Teacher stipends, funded by SPARK, so teachers are paid for their training time
School recruitment and on-the-ground partnership through MindCET
We look for two things in a school: a leader who wants change, and staff who are excited to try something new.
FOR FUNDERS
Adopt a school in the Negev
Every adoption funds teacher training, teacher stipends, and implementation coaching for a school's kindergarten-through-third-grade classrooms, January through June 2027.
$1,800
Adopt a Preschool
A preschool with up to 3 classes.
$5,000
Adopt a Small School
A school with up to 8 kindergarten-through-third-grade classrooms.
$8,000
Adopt a Large School
A school with 9 or more kindergarten-through-third-grade classrooms.
You'll know your school. Every adopter is matched to a school. As schools join the initiative, you can choose yours, or we'll assign you one, and you'll hear from it through June — what the teachers are doing, what the children are reading.
While our 501(c)(3) determination is pending, gifts to SPARK Literacy Foundation are received through our fiscal partner, Friendship Circle of Los Angeles, a registered 501(c)(3). Your receipt will come from Friendship Circle of Los Angeles, thanking you for supporting this project. Gifts are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
FOR SCHOOLS
Is your school in the Negev?
Express interest in the Negev Bilingual Literacy Initiative. Grant applications open November 1, and early access is open to a limited number of schools — sign up here to gain early access. The first cohort runs January through June 2027.
Form fields: School name · Council · Principal name · Principal email · Number of K–3 classrooms · Language of instruction (Hebrew / Arabic) · Phone
Button: Sign up
9 · Closing CTA — navy or gold band, Adopt a school Form fields: School name · Council · Principal name · Principal email · Number of K–3 classrooms · Language of instruction (Hebrew / Arabic) · Phone
Button: Sign up
9 · Closing CTA — navy or gold band, Adopt a school