ORT in Uruguay
Created in 1942, ORT Uruguay’s first school opened in April 1943, offering courses in mechanics to European Jewish émigrés. Later, courses in metalwork, electricity, and mechanics were offered as well as evening classes.
In the decades that followed, ORT expanded its operations and began catering for the local community. In the 1960s courses were offered in radio-television, refrigeration, secretarial skills, bookkeeping and cutting and sewing.
By the 1980s, ORT Uruguay was a leading trainer in electronics, telecoms and computer science and the first non-governmental educational institution in the country to be granted official tertiary level recognition for its degree. In 1996 it became Uruguay’s first officially recognised private university and is now the largest of its kind in the country.
ORT Uruguay has also been an integral part of the larger Uruguayan Jewish education system, providing technical and pedagogical support to all Jewish schools, including teacher training and IT programme development and certification.
Other ORT Uruguay activities focus on social and political relations between the Jewish community and Uruguayan society at large, as well as leadership training and management development for lay leaders and professionals of other Uruguayan Jewish communal organisations.