DOHA: Prospects for education in a world turned on its axis by the Covid-19 pandemic and how it needs to be protected and serve the needs of global youth, are to come under the spotlight in Qatar Foundation’s (QF) latest Education City Speaker Series on 16 September.
Held in partnership with Education Above All and QF’s World Innovation Summit for Education, the online panel discussion would see experts and activists explore ways in which education can be disrupted, safeguarded and made more accessible.
It would also focus on the role of young people in building more resilient societies and economies as the world aims to rebuild from the coronavirus crisis.
The virtual edition of QF’s global platform for dialogue – titled ‘Building The Future Of Education: How To Prepare Our Youth For A New Normal’ – is taking place in the wake of the UN;s first International Day to Protect Education from Attack, adopted following a proposal by Education Above All Chairperson H H Sheikha Moza bint Nasser.
Panellists are Dr Jaime Saavedra, Global Director for Education, The World Bank; Dr Hassan Rashid AlDerham, President of Qatar University; Nada Al Nashif, UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights; Dr Mamadou Dian Balde, Deputy Director within the Division of Resilience and Solutions at the UNHCR, the UN’s refugee agency; Dr Geetha Murali, CEO of Room to Read, a non-profit organisation focussed on children’s literacy and girls’ education in Asia and Africa and Obakeng Leseyane, a South African student and education activist who founded EdConnect, an initiative enhancing to education for under-served communities in his homeland.
Discussion topics
Moderated by Dominic Regester, Programme Director with non-profit organisation Salzburg Global Seminar, the discussion would focus on topics such as how the lessons education systems have learned during the pandemic may help transform them.
Topics would also include the actions and solutions required to ensure every child’s right to an education is respected and what education needs to become if it is to prepare young people for an uncertain and rapidly-changing world.
Fourth online edition
The talk will be the fourth online edition of the Education City Speaker Series, which, in keeping with QF’s commitment to ensuring dialogue never stops, has continued during the Covid-19 pandemic and drawn tens of thousands of viewers from around the world.
The latest edition would be held from 4 pm to 5.30 pm, with a 45-minute discussion being followed by an opportunity for the online audience to put questions to the panellists. It would be available to view on Microsoft Teams with English, Arabic, French, Spanish and Italian subtitles and also on QF’s Facebook and YouTube channels.
For more information and to register, one can visit www.qf.org.qa/ecss