David Pundak

David Pundak was born in 1950 in Ashdot Ya'akov Ihud

David Pundak was born in 1950 in Kibbutz Ashdot Ya'akov Ihud, the youngest of 4 children of Tzila and Yeshayahu Pundak. His eldest brother Menachem died in a plane crash in 1964 while commanding a navigators course. He is married with 3 sons.

He served as a fighter in the paratroopers reconnaissance unit and as an education officer. He earned a physics degree at Tel Aviv University in 1978. At the Technion he received a teaching certificate in 1982, a master's degree in 1986 and a doctorate in 1991, then did postdoctoral work in San Diego.

From 1980 to 1991 he built and led the physics program at Beit Yerah high school. In 1989 the Weizmann Institute of Science gave him a physics teaching prize. In 1992 he co-founded Pirhei Mada, a national astronomy education center at Kinneret College.

In 1998 he became head of the teaching department at ORT Braude College, where he later led a unit for technology in teaching. In 2005 he founded the physics unit of the new engineering school at Kinneret College. He also translated a Richard Feynman book and edited astronomy and science textbooks.

He retired in 2018 and set up a center for astronomy education at Kinneret College. In 2022 he built a robotic observatory that supports student research projects.