The 2020-2021 academic year was largely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic that broke out in March 2020. We faced an avalanche of COVID-19 related government-imposed regulations, sometimes confusing and even self-contradicting. We closed and then opened the campus several times due to national lockdowns and had to quickly adjust our teaching and exam procedures in accordance with the evolving situation. Throughout the year, we closely monitored the number of students and staff who were infected, and helped those in need.
Even as we faced the hardships caused by COVID-19, we were able to maintain smooth operations throughout this period. We built new buildings, established labs, purchased new equipment, and more. We even dared to launch several new initiatives in various administrative fields, described below.
Finance
The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) increased by 8.1% in 2021 after a decrease of 2.2% in 2020, characterized by a reduction in economic activity caused by the COVID-19 crisis and the government’s steps to curb the virus. The main contributors to this growth in 2021 were personal consumption and exports. The main challenges and emphases for the upcoming years continue to be recruitment and absorption of new faculty members, upgrading the quality of teaching and upgrading of physical facilities. During the year we introduced a new management instrument, a five-year development budget, based on our strategic plan for the Technion in 2030.
Human resources
Over the past two years, the HR Division has taken many different actions in response to the coronavirus pandemic situation at the Technion, beyond the Division’s routine activities, to enable the Technion’s administrative staff to carry out their work. In 2020-21 we introduced a new project, “know-how management,” recording and storing managerial procedures on digital platforms to avoid loss of knowledge when employees retire, expedite absorption of new employees and support for ongoing operations.
Safety Unit (SU)
The SU performed many risk assessments throughout the year. The number of reported work-related accidents in 2020-21 was 59, a 20% decrease compared to 2019-20. Eighty percent of all reported work-related accidents occurred during work, mainly within lab premises. Thirty percent of the reported work-related accidents resulted in at least a 3-day leave of absence. In addition, 14 ‘near-miss’ incidents were reported. The SU manages a NIS 6.8 million annual budget for safety improvement projects. This includes specific budget grants allocated for asbestos evacuation, advancing business licensing processes for various buildings around campus and the digitization projects, affecting the entire scope of operations at the Technion.
Security
The Security & Emergency Unit continued to promote the Technion’s preparedness for emergencies (fires, earthquake, missile attack) due to the understanding that in a crisis situation, the emergency forces in the area will not be able to operate at the Technion in the first 72 hours from its occurrence. This year, as in the previous year, the Security Unit continued to contend with enforcement of COVID-19 procedures: social distancing, mandatory masks, Green Pass, etc. The unit conducted a major drill for the Technion management, emulating a scenario where Haifa and the Technion campus come under missile attack. Insights from the drill have already been implemented to improve campus readiness for such scenarios.
Computers and Information Technology
During the 2020-21 academic year, CIS continued to provide solutions to various COVID-19 related needs, enabling the Technion to continue functioning throughout the pandemic. This included combining cloud services such as Panopto and Zoom, deploying Moodle on a cluster and adding additional support for online teaching. A dedicated students’ portal was created to support online exams and downloading digitally signed remote transcripts. When conditions enabled, support was added to hybrid teaching with rapid deployment of multimedia equipment to hundreds of classrooms and definition of respective Zoom rooms. CIS also provided support for the transition of Technion employees to working from home while preserving network security. CIS invested a significant portion of its annual budget to protect the Technion against imminent cyber threats. This year we also invested in upgrading the Technion’s High Performance Computing Center, making it the premier center in Israeli academia.
Construction and Maintenance
The Division of Construction and Maintenance at the Technion faced a second difficult year in 2021-22, navigating the obstacles posed by the pandemic. Most of the construction and maintenance activities continued despite the additional challenges: supply chain disruptions that led to long delays in receiving construction materials, higher shipping costs, workers that had to stay at home due to lockdowns and quarantine regulations and frustrated sub-contractors all resulted in delays in the completion of several new buildings. Taking advantage of the opportunity offered by a nearly empty campus till the end of the 2020-21 academic year, we managed to move forward with the construction and maintenance of ongoing operations, even shortening the timetables of some projects. We completed the Horev Sports Center, renewed 10 AC systems in various locations throughout the campus, paved a new road in the Gutwirth Science-based Industries Center, and more. This year we started to implement a Building Information Management software that mitigates the challenge of integrating among dozens of experts and specialists involved in the planning of new buildings and reduces the errors made in the old system.