The institute, founded in 1902, cares for the majority of blind children in the country. It includes a kindergarten, elementary school where subjects are taught in braille, and boarding facilities for pupils attending regular secondary school. It also has a vocational school, industrial training shop, a braille printing press, and houses for mentally or physically handicapped blind adults.

Nahum Nardi (Narodietzky) (1901–1977), composer and pianist was born in Kiev, Nardi studied the piano and composition at the Kiev, Warsaw, and Vienna conservatories and went to Palestine in 1923. There he began to give piano recitals but soon turned to composing, inspired by Arab bedouin and peasant songs and the Sephardi and Yemenite melos. Many of his songs for children and adults became folk songs for which he developed an original style of piano accompaniment.