A general expansion of ORT training programs including increased training of skilled workers and technicians in 20 countries, was voted here today at the concluding session of a three-day world ORT conference attended by some 250 delegates from 30 countries.
The conference announced that, to give economic independence to North African refugees and repatriates in France, the number of adult courses had been increased in schools in Paris, Marseilles and Lyons and in the recently opened center in Toulouse.
In Israel, an ORT program that will provide apprenticeship training for 10,000 to 15,000 persons, is projected. Other features of the Israel program include the expansion of the three-year school system and the establishment of more schools in developing areas.
The conference also announced that ORT will establish the first refrigeration school in Iran and, in September, will also set up a school of industrial dressmaking for girls. ORT activities will also be expanded in India where the organization recently opened a school for Indian Jews in Bombay.
The program also calls for modernization of school equipment and the establishment of modern technology courses such as electronics in South America, where ORT has been active since the Second World War.
Dr. Max Braude, director general of the World ORT Union reported at the conference that the training capacity of the organization has been increased in areas of most pressing need from 40 to 100 per cent during the past three years. He noted that the greatest increase in capacity — more than 100 per cent — had taken place in Israel.
A total of 70,000 persons, Dr. Braude said, had completed vocational training since 1960 at 600 ORT trade and technical units in 20 countries. He estimated the Nearnings of these graduates at more than $100,000,000. He said that a program of manual education would shortly be instituted in Ethiopia and that the first center for the training of Indian Jews had already been opened in Bombay.
In the field of technical aid to developing countries, Dr. Braude announced the establishment of an institute for the training of African technicians and vocational school teachers at the ORT center in Natanya, Israel with a current enrollment of 117 students from 18 African nations.
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