Image used for representation only.
Doha, Qatar: A unique partnership between the Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MoEHE) and the World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE), an initiative of the Qatar Foundation, has been proven to be a model for school leadership development.
The WISE Empowering Leaders of Learning (ELL) programme, a Qatar-based school leadership development programme operated by WISE in partnership with MoEHE, supports educators in developing leadership for learning skills to improve student outcomes.
Since its creation, ELL has held over ten sessions that have trained over 200 school leaders in 30 schools in Qatar, according to the WISE website. They include principals, academic vice principals, and various subject area coordinators.
The alliance between MoEHE and WISE, a true testament to the power of collaboration, has emerged as a pioneering model with the potential to reshape the way educators are prepared to lead in the ever-evolving field of education.
A report on ‘Post-pandemic National Educational Investments: School Leadership Development through Innovative Learning Designs’ published as part of the WISE report series 2024 has highlighted how the public-private partnership formed in Qatar between MoEHE and WISE has helped enhancing skills of school leaders.
According to the report, the collaboration between MoEHE and WISE has supported the design, implementation, and ongoing refinement of the school leadership development programme for school leadership teams over seven years.
“Each year, this program provided development to an identified group of Qatari school leaders beyond any development provided more generally to Qatari school leaders,” says the report commissioned by Professor and Director, University of Illinois, Chicago, Centre for Urban Educational Leadership Shelby Cosner and Director, Research and Content Development, WISE, Asmaa Alfadala.
The first ELL began in 2016 with two cohorts, each in two workshops. The first cohort consisted of twenty-five school leaders from QF schools, and the second with ninety senior leaders from 18 public schools.
According to the report, given the limited collaboration between MoEHE and WISE, only small subsets of schools were chosen for the first development series. However, the partnership has sustained and extended its leader development series through ongoing collaboration between the Ministry and WISE.
The report has highlighted, “A testament to the partnership is that it has supported four one-year programs over this period. Although successive programs have continued to engage small teams of leaders from schools, they have expanded to engage a broader assortment of schools beyond those founded by QF.”
The report on ‘Post-pandemic National Educational Investments: School Leadership Development through Innovative Learning Designs’ suggests that ELL is an example of the value of public-private partnerships to the formation and sustainability of school leader development programmes. And the league has shown sustainability even during the more challenging context of the global pandemic.
It also recommends that similar collaborations can benefit the education sector in the Global South and MENA regions.
