Nervous laughter and giggling from excited school children running through the school corridor. Girls and boys practising the official Jordanian salute at the entrance of the school building. Excited mothers and daughters prepare Syrian and Jordanian food for the guests – The last preparations for the official school handover ceremony are under way.
With this school handover ceremony, Qudra celebrated the completion of the rehabilitation work of 26 public schools in Jordan and also highlighted ongoing programme activities under its Module SO1 “Education Infrastructure”. The event took place at Al-Arqam Bin Abi Al-Arqam Mixed School in Sahab, Amman on Thursday, March 28th, 2019, and was honoured by the presence of His Excellency Sami Salaitah, Secretary General from the Ministry of Education, Corinne André, the Head of Cooperation of the European Union to Jordan and Bernd Kuzmits, Deputy Head of Development Cooperation of the German Embassy.
The celebration started with welcoming remarks by the school principal and the honorary guests and continued with a guided tour through the rehabilitated school premises, where Qudra prepared different stations to inform about current initiatives. The Qudra team was supported by volunteers from the school community who helped with the preparation of Syrian and Jordanian food and talked about their experiences and challenges around the school environment.
During the tour, Qudra presented a model on facility management to improve the learning environment in public schools through cleanliness, safety and maintenance of the new facilities. In addition, a pilot called “Smart Move” was introduced and explained, which aims at making public school transportation safer and increase access to public schools for both Jordanian and Syrian students. Qudra also presented arts and sports as part of extracurricular activities at schools, which are conducted in cooperation with “GIZ Sports for Development” as well as local and international artists. These activities will enhance integration efforts among children from host and refugee communities.
The actions of Qudra’s module “Education infrastructure” in Jordan have reached around 50.000 beneficiaries so far, of which 50% are female and 30% are non-Jordanian. The efforts primarily focused on the three governorates of Amman, Mafraq, and Zarqa. All of these communities are hosting high numbers of Syrian refugees and are supported in a combined effort by the European Union, the German and Jordanian government.
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