Conference Agenda

Both parts of this symposium address the professional challenge rapid new-deregulations of laws and standards, freeing people of human-rights (neoliberalism), have created systemic injustice, and the widest gap between the poorest and the richest since World War II. Mistrust leads to students, more than willing to work hard, dropping out of school without them or their families knowing what to do to earn a living. Children and families turn to begging at the limits of poverty and are vulnerable to recruitment into regimes of Violence, Uncertainty, Chaos and Ambiguity.

To address the professional challenge in this first part of a larger symposium the following themes are addressed by perspectives from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) including Iraq, Morocco, Palestine, and Syrian Refugees' experiences in Lebanon, Turkey and France of:

1. Authoritarian hierarchical top-down delivery of PISA driven curriculums in classrooms de-professionalize educators and administrators by removing their autonomy (Sahlberg, 2012). Reduced to transmitters of government ideology, teachers are prevented from culturally responsive lesson-planning using students’ baseline-assessments to inform differentiated learning-plans for success. This creates systemic injustice as students with the system's ‘right capital’ succeed and get richer and those without drop out of school to become beggars, or engage with risky business of trafficking of illegal goods and people, or fail at school and, in any case get poorer.

2. Capital of disadvantaged students with intersectionalities of discrimination, assessed using deficit models, is found wanting. Students’ marginalised capital remains unrecognised and no differentiated lesson-planning creates pathways to curriculum Intended Learning Outcomes. Rather, they are segregated/streamed to Special Education Needs and Disability/lower ability classrooms with low expectations. This perpetuates patterns of illiteracy and prevents accessing knowledge of community-building to stop neoliberalism and systemic injustice implemented by power of a person, not power of the law.

Presenters offer culturally relevant responses to ways their Universities' Education Departments address the following question:

1. How and in what ways can University Schools of Education act as hubs to support a school to build a professional development community of practice.

Each partner of our symposium addresses the question and our themes step by step.

Step 1 The intricate challenges posed by climate change exacerbated by war and forced migration, significantly impact impoverished families, perpetuating social injustice and impeding sustainable development. The symposium partners draw on Dewey's Professional Educators and Administrators Committees for Empowerment (PEACE) to build Participation, Experience, Association, Communication, and Environment. This theoretical foundation employing action research methodology throughout the curriculum design, delves into the multifaceted consequences of climate change, war, forced migration and reaching the limits of poverty. The adverse effects, such as irregular rainfall patterns, prolonged droughts, and heightened temperatures for nationals and for new arrivals, directly jeopardise agricultural productivity—the linchpin of rural livelihoods. Lacking resources and knowledge to navigate these challenges, impoverished families face heightened vulnerability, further exacerbated by limited access to crucial information, technologies and transparent democratic policy for social justice. Consequently, children from these families often confront early school dropout, if schooling is even available, which amplifies cycles of poverty and social injustice.

Step 2 Adapting ‘A Blueprint for Character Development for Evolution (ABCDE) to offer five stages drawing on social contract theory, to prepare teachers to recognise bias and reverse it when building community with teachers, students and families.

Each partner incorporates diverse perspectives and community building using the frameworks and methodologies above, to reverse local inequality, and through powerful Higher Education networks, mainstream them in education systems to reverse g/local inequality.

Refugees in Iraq have been the most complicated humanitarian crisis in the region, and has had an impact on all sectors of life. The areas most affected by the crisis are located in the north of the country, mainly around Mosul. This area has witnessed extremely harsh humanitarian crises for the last three decades after thousands of people were forced to flee their homes and villages for safety. Mosul has been the site of many conflicts across different fronts that have resulted in the displacement of thousands of families and the disruption of access to primary education for thousands of children. Most refugees are currently staying in refugee camps with minimum support and severe living conditions. Mosul and the surrounding areas were liberated from the terrorist groups but refugees are still in their camps with no foreseeable plan of returning home. Addressing the requirements of the support needed by people, mainly children, within such a context of uncertainty is challenging in the areas where the camps are. Thousands of children in the camps have been deprived of their rights to access education. The 1948 United Nations declaration of human rights clearly states in Article 26: ‘Everyone has the right to education’, but thousands of Iraqi refugee children are deprived of their basic education rights and are trapped in poverty with no hope for the future. Using the conceptual frameworks and theories of this symposium, lessons learned from the refugee crisis in Iraq are presented around how to effectively assess the needs of the refugees, establish a workable system to support their situation in all aspects of life, and achieve a sustainable education for them in new partnerships between Universities, school teachers, students and families.

Brown, K. M., Benkovitz, J., Muttillo, A. J., & Urban, T. (2011). Leading schools of excellence and equity: Documenting effective strategies in closing achievement gaps. Teachers College Record, 113, 57–96. Cole, J. (2012) ‘Iraq in 1939: British Alliance or Nationalist Neutrality toward the Axis?’ Britain and the World 5 (2) 204-222. Dodge, T (2006) The British mandate in Iraq, 1920-1932. The Middle East Online: Series 2: Iraq 1914–1974. Dogan, Serkan, et al (2017) ‘A glimpse at the intricate mosaic of ethnicities from Mesopotamia: Paternal lineages of the Northern Iraqi Arabs, Kurds, Syriacs, Turkmens and Yazidis’, in PloS one 12 (11). Garavini, G. (2019) The Rise and Fall of OPEC in the twentieth Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Garfield, R. (1999) Morbidity and Mortality among Iraqi Children from 1990 through 1998: Assessing the Impact of the Gulf War and Economic Sanctions. Hatem Issa, J., Jamil, H. (2010) Overview of the Education System in Contemporary Iraq in European Journal of Social Sciences, 14 (3) 360-368. Ministry of Planning (2018) Iraq National Development Plan 2018-2022. Baghdad: High National Development Plan Development Planning Committee. Wenner, J. and Campbell, T. (2017) The Theoretical and Empirical Basis of Teacher Leadership. 87 (1) pp. 134–171.

In the rural regions of Morocco, the intricate challenges posed by climate change significantly impact impoverished families, perpetuating social injustice and impeding sustainable development. Drawing on Dewey's Professional Educators, and Administrators Committees for Empowerment (PEACE) to optimise Participation, Experience, Association, Communication, and Environment) framework as a theoretical foundation and employing action research methodology throughout the curriculum design, this study delves into the multifaceted consequences of climate change. The adverse effects, such as irregular rainfall patterns, prolonged droughts, and heightened temperatures, directly jeopardise agricultural productivity—the linchpin of rural livelihoods. Lacking resources and knowledge to navigate these challenges, impoverished families face heightened vulnerability, further exacerbated by limited access to crucial information and technologies. Consequently, children from these families often confront early school dropout, amplifying cycles of poverty and social injustice. The literature review incorporates diverse perspectives, with Leach's 2008 work providing a foundational understanding of the environmental context, Adger's 2006 emphasis on vulnerability and resilience, and Pelling and High's 2005 exploration of adaptive capacity and social capital. Blaikie's 2006 focus on community-based resource management and Gupta et al.'s 2010 tool for assessing institutional adaptive capacity contribute additional insights. To address these issues, the study advocates for building communities of practice that facilitate knowledge sharing among educators, community leaders, and families. Within an action research framework, University Education Department teacher training programs play a pivotal role in equipping educators with the skills to embed climate change resilience into the curriculum. Collaborative efforts involving teachers, communities, and families inform the curriculum, ensuring its contextual relevance and promoting sustainable practices. By fostering a sense of community and empowering educators, the study aims to enhance the adaptability of rural communities to climate change, simultaneously mitigating social injustices and breaking the cycle of early school dropout and poverty.

Andalousi, S. (2022) Berries with the taste of misery: Shocking exploitation of Moroccan female workers. El-Estiklal Newspaper. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2022) Near East and North African Regional Overview of Food Security and Nutrition; Trade as an Enabler For Food Security and Nutrition. Cairo https://www.fao.org/3/cc4773en/cc4773en.pdf Morocco World News (2022) A Legacy of Abuse Continues for Moroccan Migrant Workers in Spain. https://www.moroccoworldnews.com/2019/08/279532/abuse-moroccan-migrant-workers-spain . Nuffic The Dutch Organisation for internationalization in education (2022). Primary and Secondary Education Morocco National curriculum https ://www.nuffic.nl/en/education-systems/morocco/primary-and-secondary-education Open Government Morocco (2021) national Action Plan 2021-2023. The Kingdom of Morocco https://www.opengovpartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Morocco_Action- Plan_2021-2023_EN.pdf Statista, (2023) Unemployment in Morocco in 2020 by gender and region. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1292145/unemployment-rate-in-morocco-by-gender-and-region/ United Nations. (1948). Universal Declaration of Human Rights (General Assembly Resolution 217 A). Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/universal-declarationhuman-rights/. Taysum, A. and Zohri, A. (2023). Evaluative Policy Analysis Informing Framework Proposal to Micro-Credential Leaders of Lifelong Learning through King Mohammed VI African Institute, Marrakech Framework and 2030 Agenda, Journal of Groundwork Cases and Faculty of Judgement 2(2), 209-234.

School leadership refers to the persons or teams that guide, manage or lead education institutions at multiple educational levels (Pont, 2020). In Palestine, school leaders form a community of practice which aims to maximise the collaboration among them and exchange best practices to improve their professional growth, decision making and problem solving skills during and post crises. Education improves through effective school leaders. School leaders could improve the quality of thinking, learning and management as they can share multiple scenarios with teachers and students. In the Palestinian context, school leadership could be defined as a mixture of history, memory, educational and financial crises, the daily struggle against occupation, the desire of independence and several initiatives to make tangible changes in schools (Salha & Affouneh, 2023). School leaders face various challenges like workplace problems, and leading organisational change. Data were gathered through interviews and questionnaires by a mixed method case study design, with the gathering of quantitative and qualitative data. Results, and integration are used to provide in-depth evidence for the investigated case. Specifically, the researcher of this present study used sequential design, as it began with qualitative data collection, which was analysed and used to construct the study questionnaire. It was then followed by qualitative data collection in order to strengthen the interpretation of the results of quantitative data analysis. Findings revealed school leaders made significant differences in student learning and school improvement when granted autonomy to make decisions. School leaders acquired knowledge and skills in decentralisation as a new policy for education under uncertainty. Despite the lack of resources, Palestinian school leaders demonstrated trust in learning and teaching as national interest, and belief that community engagement is a main factor in school policy. In Palestine, School leadership is a goal and a tool, a goal that should promote and a tool to create community leaders and a community of practice. It could be difficult to lead schools in uncertain conditions, which is the usual case in Palestine. School leaders showed high flexibility to overcome several challenges to normalise emergencies and to manage crises. Designing a well-structured program of school leadership within University Education Departments, during and post crises is urgently needed to secure social justice, quality education and professional development. Adoption of decentralisation policy to empower school leaders to manage crises is recommended to engender their immediate response and learning through situational practices operationalising this symposium's frameworks and methodologies.

Salha, S. & Affouneh, S. (2023). The State of Art of Educational Leadership in Palestine: The Two Faces of the Coin. In Kh. Arar et al., (Eds). Demystifying Educational Leadership and Administration in the Middle East and North Africa (1st ed, pp 153-165). Routledge. DOI: 10.4324/9781003334835-9. Pont B. (2020). A literature review of school leadership policy reforms. Eur J Educ, 55: 154–168. https://doi.org/10.1111/ejed.12398

Since the uprising in 2011 in Syria, the political regime implemented increasingly intolerant and brutal and violent practices. Migrating Syrians, fleeing from Syria for their lives as undocumented refugees, face rapidly changing bureaucracy which, as quicksand, offers no foundation for building a good life. Access to education for children and young adults operationalises ‘exclusion by inclusion’, with little incentive to study. Three important case studies, in Lebanon in Turkey and in France show how the lack of inclusive policies has led to the exclusion of Syrians in these two neighbouring countries and the European country equally. In Lebanon, Turkey and France, Syrian refugees, like Palestinian refugees do not have equal access to education and the labour market. Virtual learning degree courses that may be accessible to Syrian and Palestinian refugees are useless with no pathways to a nation state's professions or teaching. This prevents Syrians and Palestinian refugees co-constructing public policy that supports diversity, equity and boosts inclusion. Drawing on this symposium's framework as a theoretical foundation and employing action research methodology throughout the curriculum design, this study delves into the multifaceted consequences of culturally relevant challenges for Syrian refugees in these three cases. These include Violence, Uncertainty, Chaos, Ambiguity and war, a loss of home, a loss of good livelihood, a loss of family and cultural traditions, and forced migration with refugee undocumented status into nation states that do not honour the Syrian language, literacies and wisdom. This can erode memories and ABCDE offers communities the chance to reignite the powerful memories of a culture and language and build community to advocate for social justice with feedback-loops to policy makers. The PEACE can mobilise ABCDE with agendas to develop strategies with milestones, that can be monitored and evaluated to hold governments accountable, through open government partnerships, to script inclusionary policies for education and all ares of the quadruple helix to realise social justice. Step by step PEACE and ABCDE can be mainstreamed with Virtual Universities in the digital economy offering high quality Micro-Credential Modules for teacher training and Continuing Professional Development to build communities’ languages and cultures of democracy to dismantle systemic injustices.

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