Pal-Think concludes a specialized training program entitled “Preparing a Civic Educator”
Following seven consecutive days of intensive training, Pal-Think concluded the program “Preparing a Civic Educator” as part of the project “Civic Education Corps” which is implemented by Pal-Think for Strategic Studies and funded by the National Endowment for Democracy “NED”. The training targeted a group of female and male youth and concentrated on a number of issues related to civil society, democracy, and human rights.
The first day of the training was run by Mr. Abdallah Sharshara –lawyer and legal researcher- entitled “International Human Rights Law and the Palestinian case”. Sharshara has presented the importance of education and awareness about human rights in addition to their role in improving and advancing societies and nations. Thereafter, he talked about the emergence of the human rights system, its characteristics, and components as well as the international bill of human rights. He also noted the principles and standards of human rights included in the Palestinian legal system and compared it with the international human rights law.
In his turn, Mr. Mohammed Talbani -researcher and legal trainer- has run the second training day entitled “The Standards of Democracy under the Palestinian System”. Talbani has emphasized the observance of respecting freedoms and human rights as part of the democracy standards. He also shed light on the disparities between civil and political rights along with the rest of other rights and freedoms. Moreover, he explained the state of the Palestinian political system, its unity, and the extent to which it exercises national sovereignty. Besides, he clarified the meaning and role of the principle “separation of powers” in the democratic system, highlighting the reality of the legislative and executive authorities in Palestine.
As for the third, fourth, and fifth training days, they were run by Dr. Islam Attallah with the title “Skills of Research Writing in the Issues of Democracy and Human Rights”. In his turn, he presented the concept of research papers on democracy and human rights by noting “they are analytical articles aiming at describing and analyzing the issues and problems resulting from public policies in addition to recording the results of these policies on democracy and human rights in the society as well as the country”
He also mentioned that a research paper criticizes the polices resulting from country’s conduct besides providing recommendations and alternatives for decision makers as well as direct and indirect contributors involved in making the public decisions.
Attallah has also explained the stages of the writing process in addition to emphasizing that a researcher has to answer several questions before writing his research paper, which are: “why am I writing about this topic”, “who is the target audience”, “what is the main message/issue of the article?”, “What effect can this topic make?”.
Throughout the sessions, the training group was divided into small research groups for selecting a research topic to begin implementing the theories and concepts presented during the three training days.
On the sixth training day, Ms. Samah Alsafadi -entrepreneurship specialist- has talked about “Presentation and Communication Skills”, emphasizing that the skills of public speaking and presentation fall amongst the most crucial interpersonal and practical skills existing in the current age for individuals and entities as they aim at maximizing the efficiency, productivity, and performance of an individual.
On the seventh training day, Mr. Saji Obaid -trainer in pressure and advocacy- has talked about the skills of pressure and advocacy for the issues related to democracy and human rights. He explained the stages associated with the advocacy process, the skills of writing initiatives for democracy and human rights issues, and how to reach the target group of the advocacy campaign.
“A Civic Education Corps” project aims at preparing female and male youth to be educators in the issues related to civil society, especially democracy and human rights in addition improving their research skills in these fields. Therefore, the trainers will work on implementing a number of awareness sessions to spread the knowledge and skills gained by the trainees to their peers from youth. Moreover, the trainees will be preparing research papers tackling the issues of democracy and human rights under the supervision of a competent group of researchers and writers. They will also conduct a series of radio episodes and public sessions to present the outcomes of their research papers.
