Egyptian Teachers Offer Distance Learning for Palestinian Students
(AWP) - A group of Egyptian teachers and volunteers has set up an educational platform for distance learning for Palestinian students, in light of the destruction of the schools and educational institutions in the Gaza Strip during the current Israeli campaign.
Most of the schools in Gaza have turned into shelters for tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians seeking a safe haven, away from Israeli shelling.
The idea of the platform, set up by Tamer Anwar, the CEO of a company offering educational, training and consultancy services, relies on teaching the Palestinian curricula through photographic material to be prepared by specialized teachers of all grade levels, from kindergarten to secondary.
“Some ask whether what we offer is useful. We are trying to save what we can. The current situation is that there is no education, and schools are closed in Palestine. Building schools and the reconstruction of Gaza after all this devastation will take years. There has to be an alternative to suit these circumstances, and that is what we are offering,” said Anwar.
“All that we ask is that the education ministry in Palestine recognize us on the grounds that we are providing a temporary solution. We are ready to offer all the required guarantees, including quality, privacy, assessment and anything else. All that we want is to prevent having Palestinian students lose an academic year,” he added.
Hadeer al-Samady, the distance learning school’s director, said that their educational platform will be set up in a manner suiting Palestinian students.
The service will be gratis, and lessons will be provided through videos, which students can watch at their convenience.
“The question was, how we should prepare this platform to suit them, and to enable them to follow up via live transmission? We decided to prepare recorded videos that can be watched at any time. The Internet might not be available now, but it will be later. By then, the lessons will be available,” she explained.
About 500 Egyptian teachers of all specializations volunteered to offer the educational content.
The founders said they faced two key challenges when they first set up the platform. The first was to find volunteer teachers with enough experience handling modern technology, while the second was to train them quickly to the Palestinian educational curricula for all grade levels.