Dubai: A Dh11 million programme was launched on Monday to give students exposed to armed conflict access to education.
The Dubai Cares initiative titled ‘Rebuild Palestine. Start with Education’, includes a programme aimed at helping the student population in Gaza.
Currently, a six-year-old in Gaza has already been exposed to three conflicts.
The programme’s immediate goal is to ease the devastating effects of this summer’s seven-week military conflict on the education sector in Gaza by providing infrastructure and psycho-social support services to children.
The Dubai Cares programme will work in partnership with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).
“We need to wake up to the situation in Gaza and prepare for the long-term impact of the current uncertain and volatile situation on its children,” Tarek Al Gurg, Chief Executive Officer at Dubai Cares, said.
As part of the programme, 175,809 children enrolled in 151 United Nations schools will receive weekly arts and sports classes led by specialised teachers.
These classes will be structured around psycho-social counselling utilising arts and sports, and will also include training to guide teachers during these classes.
Meanwhile, 1,620 students in UNRWA schools will receive psycho-social support to develop their coping mechanisms and ease their distress. Individual support plans will also be developed between the child and a counsellor to identify specific issues and then formulate a response and allocate resources.
The programme will also provide 1,500 students access to primary and lower secondary education through the construction of a 20-classroom school, which includes furniture and water and sanitation facilities.
Al Gurg explained that Palestine’s youngest citizens have not only suffered severe physical and psychological trauma over the course of the military conflict, but that the large-scale destruction of the educational infrastructure is going to further impair their futures.
The military operations that took place in the Gaza Strip between July and August this year led to the deaths of more than 2,000 people and destroyed the homes of an estimated 100,000 people.
The programme will focus on improving the educational infrastructure while supporting the psycho-social rehabilitation of the children in Gaza by making sure that they have access to quality education.
“This means building up sound infrastructure and developing the relevant curricula as well as investing in teachers so that they can assist students dealing with trauma to develop coping mechanisms, thus successfully settling them back into their educational routines,” Al Gurg said.
