In HIT women advancement is a major goal

Adv. Orna (Bar Nes) Kopolovich, is a faculty member at the Faculty of Technology Management, and at the faculty of instructional Technologies. She is an advisor to the president of HIT for Women Advancement in Academia issues and the commissioner against sexual harassment. Orna also serves as the head of the Negotiation and Business Innovation center at HIT.

 

Orna had started her academic career in Communications and Politics, continued to do her Master's degree in Management and Communication and then studied again towards first and second degrees in Law. She then had completed a second degree and a Ph.D. in Negotiation Management. She's married and a mother of 2 young kids.

 

“Both my academic and professional paths were not predictable at least not for me, but one thing led to another and it seems like it was all necessary. I've registered to study Biology, thinking that I would be able to complete my degree within a year, but the day before the school year started I understood that as much as Biology excited me, I'm more fascinated by people, and so biology was exchanged with Politics and Communication.

 

“I've discovered an exciting world of knowledge that continued throughout my second degree in Management and Communication. In order to compliment the academic knowledge with some practice, I've studied for 2 more years at the Advertisers' Union and had specialized in advertising for unique audiences (women and children).

 

These studies had led me to do some fascinating work in the advertising world in addition to tutoring and teaching at the university.

 

 

Dealing with the world of advertising, made me tackle some fascinating judicial issues regarding human rights and regulation. I've understood that these issues are going to challenge the academic and business worlds for the next coming years and it made me decide to further study them thoroughly. The field of intellectual property was just emerging then in Israel and it was available only as a Master's degree in Law, so I took a deep breath and started my B.A in law in order to later accomplish my Master's degree.

 

After I've become a lawyer and a mediator, I went on to study towards M.A. in Law and finally had the opportunity to specialize In Intellectual property and negotiation. Back I've taught in several academic institutions in addition to working both in Israel and abroad. I was a young and very busy mother, but my curiosity has won over all the difficulties and I started my Ph.D. in Negotiation Management.

 

I find the topic of negotiation to completely combine my love to people and the curiosity to understanding human behavior, together with my broad academic education. All the years I've invested in academic studies, were in hind sight, a kind of preparation for my present position. I'm completely amazed at each effort to crack open the “Black box” of the negotiation process and to realize how technology can be harnessed to making it better.

 

I was invited to HIT over 20 years ago, to give a guest lecture. That HAS SINCE then, TURNED into a love story with HIT and especially with the people.
A lot of eyebrows were rasied when they heard that I have decided to leave the well estaclidhrd university and the promising career.

 

"A report written by the Council for Higher Education, last year, showed that the relative number of women in academic institutions is decreasing annually, as their rank gets higher. This data is characteristic of all higher education institutions including HIT. Following that report, the council had declared women advancement in the academic world as one of its major goals and required the appointment of special advisors in all academic institutions.

 

Last year I've taken upon myself the position of the president's advisor for women's advancement in HIT. I see it as a great opportunity to take action towards true gender equality and to assist in creating a proper infrastructure for staff members and students and to facilitate academic studies, mainly technological, to women"

 

For more than a decade I was the only woman in the academic staff of the faculty of Technology Management and I'm happy to see that other women have joined us since.

 

I'm proud to be part of an academic institution which sees women advancement and women excellence as one of its major goals in the next five years.