The Boeing Company announced today that it will partner with AMIDEAST West Bank and Gaza in the Palestinian territory to help develop a one-year pilot program for Palestinian school teachers designed to significantly improve the quality of English instruction at the primary level.
The Professional Certificate in English Teaching (PCET) program will be developed and piloted by AMIDEAST, while the Boeing grant will be used to train an initial group of 20 primary school English teachers in the West Bank and Gaza on the curriculum. It is estimated that up to 2,000 primary school pupils will benefit from this program.
“We are honoured to be able to contribute to philanthropic efforts in the Arab world like this one, designed to provide better services that benefit the community,” said John B. Craig, Boeing vice president in the Middle East. “By training teachers committed to reforming the way the language is taught on the primary levels in their schools, we hope this initiative enhances the overall environment for Palestinian children learning English.”
Steven Keller, Country Director, AMIDEAST West Bank and Gaza, said: “We are confident that this new project will foster a culture of learning among teachers and continued professional development. AMIDEAST envisions expanding the scope of the project so that additional primary school English teachers across Palestine can receive this training to benefit thousands of additional pupils.”
The PCET training approach creates an innovative, sustainable capacity-building initiative tailored to the training needs of primary school English teachers identified during AMIDEAST's needs assessment and analysis of primary school English language instruction in 2005. PCET specifically addresses a primary education strategy focused on expanding access to underserved groups and improving the overall quality of education and its relevance by providing training to all geographic areas of Palestine, both urban and rural (rollout and expansion permitting successfully securing additional funds based on the results of the proposed Boeing-funded pilot). Finally, the project directly strengthens institutional capacity to more effectively manage and deliver education programs by assisting Palestinian primary schools in delivering an English curriculum and teacher training to teachers throughout the West Bank and Gaza.
