Department of Education introduces 1st Education Development PhD program in Palestine

Birzeit University’s Educational Development Doctorate Program was accredited by the National Accreditation and Quality Assurance Board in the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research.

Hosted by the Faculty of Education, the program aims to prepare specialized educators in the fields of teacher education, school improvement, and educational leadership in the Palestinian context, which is characterized by us being under a colonialist-settler regime. This program acts as a stepping-stone for emancipatory pedagogy; aiming to fill the need for development of faculty members in different education colleges in the Palestinian universities that provide programs for educating teachers that hold no education degrees. The program works on facilitating the career development for leading practitioners in the Ministry of Education, the state educational sector, and other non-state sectors. It deals with investing in human resource development and those in leadership roles in educational colleges and institutions generally. Additionally, it applies changes to the curriculum and teaching and learning methods, especially since it is the first of its kind in Palestine.

The program is comprised of 54 credit hours, eight elective credit hours, and 24 thesis credit hours. Moreover, students will go through a comprehensive exam gauging their proficiency in the program’s core subjects, along with their analytical and synthetic capabilities.

The program is a great milestone for Birzeit University’s Faculty of Education, which aims to introduce various undergraduate and graduate programs. For as long back as the seventies, Birzeit University was the first university to introduce a master’s program in education in 1976. In 2010, the Department of Education expanded into a faculty. The Faculty of Education is comprised of two departments: the Curriculum and Education Department and the Department of Physical Education. The faculty offers four bachelor disciplines, nine disciplines of educational qualification diploma, and two master’s programs. The master’s in education has six main focal points: science education, mathematics education, teaching English as a foreign language, educational administration, educational consultancy, and special education, while the second master’s program covers physical education and sports sciences. These various programs aim to improve the level of education in Palestine through research and practice.