In the last decades, Israel’s high-tech entrepreneurs have established the country’s reputation as the “Start-Up Nation,” a scrappy bunch of innovators, many of them products of the army’s incubator atmosphere.
This week, the next generation of Israeli scientists visited the Big Apple.
A group of Israeli high school students demonstrated their solutions to current problems in “Street Labs,” a hands-on event Tuesday in Union Square.
Their inventions and projects included an Android application that allows users to scan foods for specific allergens, a device that prevents drunk driving by informing parents that a drunk driver is in the car, a system that prevents people from illegally parking in handicapped parking spots by issuing an automatic ticket and a program that summarizes students’ research papers.
“The creativity and ingenuity exemplified by these students is inspiring to us all,” said Israeli Consul General Ido Aharoni.
Street Labs is based on the work of Israel Sci-Tech Schools, which incorporates STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) curricula in 205 Israeli educational institutions. Fourteen high schools in the New York area use the curriculum.
Ten percent of Israeli high school students attend a Sci-Tech High School.
The visiting students also traveled this week to several high school classes in Manhattan and the Bronx.
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