Seminar on "Educational Developments in Teaching and Learning"
The Office of the Vice-President for Academic Affairs organized a seminar on "Educational Developments in Teaching and Learning: Applications at BZU", dated 3 December 2007.
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he Vice-President for Academic Affairs, Dr. Abdellatif Abu-Hijleh, elucidated that this seminar comes within a series of seminars and workshops pertaining to teaching and learning, as well as to the enhancement of the faculty's and students' performance that will be shortly conducted.
Dr, Abu-Hijleh pointed out that the seminar will address the experiences of various bodies at BZU in the E-learning field and how it supports higher education, citing the experiences of the Center for Continuing Education (CCE) and the experiences of the faculty members at the Education Department, Faculty of Information Technology and Faculty of Engineering. He underlined that E-learning is not a substitute for direct teaching, but it allies with direct teaching. He added that BZU is represented in the E-learning Program with the EU universities and the Ministry of Education within the Inter-Universities Network for Open and Distance Learning Project (RUFO).
Dr. Abu-Hijleh affirmed that despite the prevailing conditions, BZU is rated as one of the top universities according to the international classification, indicating that BZU has recently established Ibn Rushd for Educational Development Unit and the Academic Support Unit for the graduate studies students. He said that BZU is currently working on the enhancement of students' performance in English language skills project, managed by the Department of Languages and Translation, in addition to the newly funded Project namely "Virtual Reality", which is one of a kind in the Arab Region, that aims at supporting and updating the teaching and learning process through modern technology.
"Towards the Improvement of the Quality of Teaching and Learning in the Palestinian Universities" was the title of the presentation by the Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Dr. Maher Hashweh, followed by another presentation titled: "international Challenges and Trends in Higher Education", by CCE's Director, Mr. Marwan Tarazi.
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he Director of Innovation in Learning Unit, Dr. Osama Mimi, addressed the "Electronic Option in Teaching and Learning", while Ms. Faten Khalaf from the Department of Languages and Translation and Mr. Maurice Baqleh from the Department of Education and Psychology presented the Unit's experience with E-learning.
The Chairperson of the Computer Systems Engineering Department, Dr. Wasel Ghanem, addressed RUFO and Dr. Ahmad Janazrah from the Education and Psychology Department introduced the experience of E-Learning in higher education.
Finally, Mr. Belal Abu-Eideh from the Ibn Rushd for Educational Development Unit talked about the Unit's vision, exemplified in introducing programs in four channels: university programs, school programs, research and consultancy programs, as well as programs related to documentation of knowledge and exchange of experiences. Dr. Hasan Shibly from the Department of Mechanical Engineering presented the "Virtual Reality Project".
