UNESCO Regional Conferences in Support of Global Literacy and Innovations in Education Symposium 3

Literacy Challenges in the Arab Region - Building Partnerships and Promoting Innovative Approaches"

UNESCO and the Qatar Foundation are cooperating and joining two of their major initiatives to address the literacy challenge in the Arab States.

Literacy remains a major challenge globally. Worldwide, more than 781 million adults cannot read or write. More than two-thirds of this population are women. Moreover, millions of children are deprived of quality education. In the Arab Region, the literacy rate is 66.4 percent; about 58 million adults are illiterate, out of which 66 percent are women, and there is a notable disparity of literacy rates between countries. There is a need for sustained commitment and action from countries and their partners to improve this situation. UNESCO and the Qatar Foundation have joined hands to make an impact on literacy in the Arab States.

This Conference is part of a series of regional conferences which will be organized by UNESCO in the framework of United Nations Literacy Decade (UNLD) and UNESCO's Literacy Initiative for Empowerment (LIFE). They are part of a major drive to promote literacy at international and regional levels. The goal is to place literacy on the agenda of national governments and international partners, and to assist countries in addressing their literacy challenges, thereby making a real and measurable impact on the lives of their citizens, and contributing to sustainable human development and poverty reduction. These Conferences build upon and extend the work begun at the White House Conference on Global Literacy in September 2006, hosted by Laura Bush, First Lady of the United States of America and Honorary Ambassador for the UNLD.

At the same time, the Conference is organized within the framework of the Qatar Foundation's 'Innovations in Education Series' which is an exciting series of symposia to promote sharing of cutting edge research in education. The goal of this series is to offer a forum for international scholars to explore the implications of their research to practical educational applications. The series began in 2004 with a forum dedicated to The Art and Science Partnership and in 2006 explored Technology, Empowerment and Education. It is within this framework that the Qatar Foundation, under their Innovations in Education Series, and UNESCO, under their Regional Conferences in Support of Global Literacy, are jointly presenting the Conference on 'Literacy Challenges in the Arab States: Building Partnerships and Promoting Innovative Approaches' to encourage the regional community to address the literacy challenges in the Arab region..

The Conference will examine literacy challenges specific to the region, advocate for literacy and lay the groundwork for concrete country support. It will present and disseminate innovative and effective literacy practices from the region; review selected outstanding cases from other regions; identify and discuss main challenges and achievements in literacy and make recommendations on the way forward; decide on new courses of action; build cooperation among stakeholders; and mobilize partners and resources for tangible interventions at the country level.