Teachers and the Tech Ideology: Navigating Influence in Israeli Public Education

Abstract

Background:

Technology and the tech industry have gained increasing power in many societies over the past half century. In Israel, like other countries in the Global North, the public education system has experienced a shift toward enterprise culture, with policymakers and educators jointly collaborating in idealizing the Israeli high-tech sector.

Focus of the Study:

In light of the growing dominance of tech ideology in the Israeli education system, the study explores how dominant views of the tech industry may influence teachers’ perceptions of the industry and tech ideology’s role in education. We were particularly interested in exploring how a host of factors, including teachers’ previous professional experience in the tech industry (or lack thereof) and the content area they teach, shape their perspectives on the involvement of the tech industry in Israeli public education.

Research Design:

Our data consists of interviews with 22 Israeli high school teachers. The participants were purposively chosen to include two groups of teachers who differ in their professional experience and background: teachers who joined the profession following substantial experience in the tech industry and teachers who joined the teaching profession early on and evolved solely through its ranks.

Conclusion:

Findings suggest that (1) teachers both admire and resist tech ideology and its impact on schools, and (2) their attitudes toward the tech industry relate to their educational aims, highlighting the significance of tech involvement and its hegemonic impact on the future of teachers and public education. The discussion employs institutional isomorphism to illustrate how the education system might imitate the tech industry, identifying discursive and normative conditions under which institutional educational change may be legitimized or resisted.

Keywords

Teacher perspectives tech ideology neoliberalism institutional isomorphism educational aims

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abel

V. R.

Tondeur

Sang

(2022). Teacher perceptions about ICT integration into classroom instruction. Education Sciences, 12(9), 609.

Adams

W. C.

(2015). Conducting semi-structured interviews. In Newcomer

K. E.

Hatry

H. P.

Wholey

J. S.

(Eds.), Handbook of practical program evaluation (pp. 492–505). Jossey-Bass.

Addi-Raccah

(2006). School leaders’ collaboration with external school agencies. The International Journal of Knowledge, Culture, and Change Management: Annual Review, 6(2), 27–38. https://doi.org/10.18848/1447-9524/CGP/v06i02/49236

Alfarwan

(2025). Generative AI use in K–12 education: A systematic review. Frontiers in Education, 10, 1647573. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2025.1647573

Alfi-Nissan

S. R.

Gabay-Egozi

Pagis

(2021). Being a light unto the nations in entrepreneurship [in Hebrew]. Israeli Sociology, Special Issue: Innovation and Entrepreneurship in the Start-Up Nation-Sociological Perspectives, 22(2), 108–127.

Amdur

Mero-Jaffe

(2017). Interrelations between policymakers’ intentions and school agents’ interpretation of accountability policy in Israel. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 25, 84.

Anderson

Cohen

(2015). Redesigning the identities of teachers and leaders: A framework for studying new professionalism and educator resistance. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 23(85). https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.v23.2086

Apple

M. W.

(1978). Ideology, reproduction, and educational reform. Comparative Education Review, 22(3), 367–387.

Apple

M. W.

(2004). Creating difference: Neo-liberalism, neo-conservatism and the politics of educational reform. Educational Policy, 18(1), 12–44. https://doi.org/10.1177/0895904803260022

10.

Apple

M. W.

(2006). Understanding and interrupting neoliberalism and neoconservatism in education. Pedagogies: An International Journal, 1(1), 21–26. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15544818ped0101_4

11.

Apple

M. W.

(2012). Education and power. Routledge.

12.

Aronson

Bialostok

(2016). “Do some wondering”: Children and their self-understanding selves in early elementary classrooms. Symbolic Interaction, 39(2), 229–251. https://doi.org/10.1002/symb.223

13.

Ball

S. J.

(2003a). Class strategies and the education market: The middle classes and social advantage. Routledge.

14.

Ball

S. J.

(2003b). The teacher’s soul and the terrors of performativity. Journal of Education Policy, 18(2), 215–228. https://doi.org/10.1080/0268093022000043065

15.

Ball

S. J.

Olmedo

(2013). Care of the self, resistance and subjectivity under neoliberal governmentalities. Critical Studies in Education, 54(1), 85–96. https://doi.org/10.1080/17508487.2013.740678

16.

Bengio

Hinton

Yao

Song

Abbeel

Darrell

Harari

Y. N.

Zhang

Xue

Shalev-Shwartz

Hadfield

Clune

Maharaj

Hutter

Baydin

A. G.

McIlraith

Gao

Acharya

Krueger

Dragan

Torr

Russell

Kahneman

Brauner

Mindermann

(2024). Managing extreme AI risks amid rapid progress. Science, 384(6698), 842–845.

17.

Bourn

(2016). Teachers as agents of social change. International Journal of Development Education and Global Learning, 7(3), 63–77.

18.

Brown

(2017). Biting the hand that feeds you? Teachers engage with an ethnography of neoliberalism in education. Policy Futures in Education, 15(2), 185–201. https://doi.org/10.1177/1478210316639415

19.

Carey

J. W.

(1992). Technology and ideology: The case of the telegraph. In Communication as culture (pp. 201–237). Routledge.

20.

Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). (2024). Christmas 2024 – Christians in Israel. https://www.cbs.gov.il/he/mediarelease/DocLib/2024/409/11_24__409e.pdf

21.

Charmaz

(2014). Constructing grounded theory. Sage.

22.

Cochran-Smith

Cummings Carney

Stringer Keefe

Burton

Chang

W.-C.

Fernandez

M. B.

Miller

A. F.

Sanchez

J. G.

Baker

(2018). Reclaiming accountability in teacher education. Teacher College Press.

23.

Cox

(1971). The virgin and the dynamo revisited: An essay on the symbolism of technology. Soundings: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 54(2), 125–146.

24.

Crawford-Garrett

Sánchez

R. M.

Tyson

(2017). The trauma of teaching in an era of high-stakes accountability. Critical Education, 8(3), 1–21.

25.

Darling-Hammond

(2000). Teacher quality and student achievement. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 8, 1.

26.

Davidson

Rein

Tamir

(2024). The time-making capacity of the technology industry and its consequences for public life. Journal of Cultural Economy, 17(1), 55–72. https://doi.org/10.1080/17530350.2023.2261483

27.

DiMaggio

P. J.

Powell

W. W.

(1983). The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields. American Sociological Review, 48(2), 147–160.

28.

Dinc

(2019). Prospective teachers’ perceptions of barriers to technology integration in education. Contemporary Educational Technology, 10(4), 381–398.

29.

Dunn

A. H.

(2018). Leaving a profession after it’s left you: Teachers’ public resignation letters as resistance amidst neoliberalism. Teachers College Record, 120(9), 1–34. https://doi.org/10.1177/016146811812000906

30.

Feuerstein

(2001). Selling our schools? Principals’ views on schoolhouse commercialism and school–business interactions. Educational Administration Quarterly, 37(3), 322–371. https://doi.org/10.1177/00131610121969343

31.

Frumkin

Galaskiewicz

(2004). Institutional isomorphism and public sector organizations. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 14(3), 283–307. https://doi.org/10.1093/jopart/muh028

32.

Geiger

(2020). Silicon Valley, disruption, and the end of uncertainty. Journal of Cultural Economy, 13(2), 169–184. https://doi.org/10.1080/17530350.2019.1684337

33.

Giroux

H. A.

(1980). Teacher education and the ideology of social control. Journal of Education, 162(1), 5–27.

34.

Giroux

H. A.

(2013). Neoliberalism’s war against teachers in dark times. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies, 13(6), 458–468. https://doi.org/10.1177/1532708613503769

35.

Guerrero-Nieto

C. H.

Quintero

(2021). Elementary school teachers in neoliberal times: The silent voices that make educational policies work. Profile: Issues in Teachers’ Professional Development, 23(1), 27–40.

36.

Hall

McGinity

(2015). Conceptualizing teacher professional identity in neoliberal times: Resistance, compliance and reform. Education Policy Analysis Archives, 23, 88. https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.v23.2092

37.

Hendrikse

Adriaans

Klinge

T. J.

Fernandez

(2022). The big techification of everything. Science as Culture, 31(1), 59–71. https://doi.org/10.1080/09505431.2021.1984423

38.

Israel Innovation Authority. (2022a). Annual innovation report: State of high-tech 2022. https://innovationisrael.org.il/en/report_year/report_2022/

39.

Israel Innovation Authority. (2022b). Snapshot: Women in high-tech 2022 [in Hebrew]. https://innovationisrael.org.il/sites/default/files/202022%קטייהב20%םישנ%20חוד.pdf

40.

Israeli Knesset. (2020). The teachers in the Israeli education system [in Hebrew]. The Research and Information Center of the Israeli Knesset (Parliament). https://fs.knesset.gov.il/globaldocs/MMM/f0674be3-21c5-ea11-8107-00155d0aee38/2_f0674be3-21c5-ea11-8107-00155d0aee38_11_15180.pdf

41.

Jackson

A. Y.

Mazzei

L. A.

(2013). Plugging one text into another: Thinking with theory in qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry, 19(4), 261–271. https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800412471510

42.

Jeong

D. W.

Luschei

T. F.

(2018). Are teachers losing control of the classroom? Global changes in school governance and teacher responsibilities, 2000–2015. International Journal of Educational Development, 62, 289–301. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2018.07.004

43.

Karppi

Nieborg

D. B.

(2021). Facebook confessions: Corporate abdication and Silicon Valley dystopianism. New Media and Society, 23(9), 2634–2649. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444820933549

44.

Larkin

(2013). The politics and poetics of infrastructure. Annual Review of Anthropology, 42, 327–343. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-anthro-092412-155522

45.

Lewis

M. M.

Modeste

M. E.

Johnson

R. M.

(2023). The rise of the school district chief equity officer: Moving beyond mimetic isomorphism and promoting anti-racist systemic change. Educational Administration Quarterly, 59(1), 143–178.

46.

Lubienski

Yemini

Maxwell

(2022). The rise of external actors in education: Shifting boundaries globally and locally. Policy Press.

47.

Maggor

Frenkel

(2022). The start-up nation. In Ben-Porat

Feniger

Filc

Kabalo

Mirsky

(Eds.), Routledge handbook on contemporary Israel (1st ed., pp. 423–435). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429281013-35

48.

Masry-Herzallah

Stavissky

(2021). The attitudes of elementary and middle school students and teachers towards online learning during the corona pandemic outbreak. SN Social Sciences, 1(3), 71.

49.

Mayer

Mills

(2021). Professionalism and teacher education in Australia and England. European Journal of Teacher Education, 44(1), 45–61.

50.

Mickelson

R. A.

(1999). International business machinations: A case study of corporate involvement in local educational reform. Teachers College Record, 100(3), 476–512. https://doi.org/10.1177/016146819810000301

51.

Mosco

(2004). The digital sublime: Myth, power, and cyberspace. MIT Press.

52.

Nachmias

Mioduser

Forkosh-Baruch

(2010). ICT use in education: Different uptake and practice in Hebrew-speaking and Arabic-speaking schools in Israel. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26(6), 492–506.

53.

Neely

M. T.

Sheehan

Williams

C. L.

(2023). Social inequality in high tech: How gender, race, and ethnicity structure the world’s most powerful industry. Annual Review of Sociology, 49, 319–338. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-soc-031021-034202

54.

Peters

(2001). Education, enterprise culture and the entrepreneurial self: A Foucauldian perspective. The Journal of Educational Enquiry, 2(2), Article 2.

55.

Plantin

J.-C.

Lagoze

Edwards

P. N.

Sandvig

(2018). Infrastructure studies meet platform studies in the age of Google and Facebook. New Media & Society, 20(1), 293–310.

56.

Puttick

(2017). ‘You’ll see that everywhere’: Institutional isomorphism in secondary school subject departments. School Leadership & Management, 37(1–2), 61–79.

57.

Rose

N. S.

(1989). Governing the soul: The shaping of the private self. Routledge.

58.

Rowe

(2025). Education markets and school segregation: Causes, consequences and impacts. In Zancajo

Fontdevila

Jabbar

Verger

(Eds.), Research handbook on education privatization and marketization (pp. 250–264). Edward Elgar Publishing.

59.

Russakoff

(2015). The prize: Who’s in charge of America’s schools? Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

60.

Schonert-Reichl

K. A.

(2017). Social and emotional learning and teachers. The Future of Children, 27(1), 137–155.

61.

Schroeder

Currin

McCardle

(2020). ‘Solidarity, sisters! We’re all crazy’: The moral madness of opting out of high-stakes testing. Educational Studies, 56(4), 347–365. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131946.2020.1757447

62.

Selwyn

(2016). Is technology good for education? John Wiley & Sons.

63.

Sims

(2017). Disruptive fixation: School reform and the pitfalls of techno-idealism. Princeton University Press.

64.

Singer

(2017, June 6). The Silicon Valley billionaires remaking America’s schools. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/06/technology/tech-billionaires-education-zuckerberg-facebook-hastings.html

65.

Slakmon

(2016). Educational technology policy in Israel. Pedagogy Culture and Society, 25. https://doi.org/10.1080/14681366.2016.1231709

66.

Smylie

M. A.

Bay

Tozer

S. E.

(1999). Preparing teachers as agents of change. Teachers College Record, 100(5), 29–62.

67.

Tamir

Davidson

(2020). The good despot: Technology firms’ interventions in the public sphere. Public Understanding of Science, 29(1), 21–36.

68.

Tamir

Rein

Davidson

(2025). School principals’ perceptions of the tech industry’s involvement in public schools. International Journal of Leadership in Education, 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1080/13603124.2025.2559752

69.

Taylor

L. A.

Hikida

(2025). Keeping teachers off balance: Neoliberalism and fragmented subjectivity in everyday classroom life. The Urban Review, 57(2), 216–238.

70.

Thompson

Jones

(2021). The everyday traumas of neoliberalism in women teachers’ bodies: Lived experiences of the teacher who is never good enough. Power and Education, 13(2), 88–99. https://doi.org/10.1177/17577438211011631

71.

Turner

(2006). From counterculture to cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the rise of digital utopianism. University Of Chicago Press.

72.

Turner

Larson

(2015). Network celebrity: Entrepreneurship and the new public intellectuals. Public Culture, 27(1), 53–84. https://doi.org/10.1215/08992363-2798343

73.

Williamson

(2018). Silicon startup schools: Technocracy, algorithmic imaginaries and venture philanthropy in corporate education reform. Critical Studies in Education, 59(2), 218–236.

74.

Yemini

Cegla

Sagie

(2018). A comparative case-study of school-LEA-NGO interactions across different socio-economic strata in Israel. Journal of Education Policy, 33(2), 243–261. https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2017.1328078

75.

Yonah

Dahan

Markovich

(2008). Neo-liberal reforms in Israel’s education system: The dialectics of the state. International Studies in Sociology of Education, 18(3–4), 199–217. https://doi.org/10.1080/09620210802492799