British council director in Syria: efforts to enhance higher education; human resource development
Syria-UK, Politics, 11/19/2003

British Council Director and Cultural Attache in Syria Paul Doubleday has recently assumed his new post as a Director of the British Council in Syria.

Filled with energy and great enthusiasm to foster UK- Syria bilateral educational and cultural cooperation relations he said in a statement to ArabicNews.com that before he assumed his new post in Damascus just two weeks ago he served in Sudan as Director of the British Council for two years 2001-2003 and earlier in Jordan for three years as Teaching Center Manager.

He said that in total, he worked for the British Council for 15 years, mostly in the Arab states.

He said that the British Council in Damascus is working to create opportunities for educational and cultural partnership between Syria and the UK, noting that this can be seen through ongoing activities such as the Higher Education Capacity Building Project between the Syrian Ministry of Higher Education and the British Council as well as the British Henri Oguike Dance Company performances which will take place in Damascus and Aleppo from 2nd through 5th December.

He added that "we are building partnerships through our Connecting Futures Program, adding that this year we were working with five young students from the University of Damascus and five students from the UK who will visit Syria. The ten students will go to Cairo to attend a Youth Forum exploring issues relevant to youth in the UK and the Arab world."

Highlighting other activities of bilateral cooperation between Syria and the UK, Doubleday said that the British Council is also involved in a youth theatre project where pieces of theatre will be created by youth from Syria and the UK as a nucleus for an expanded network that brings youth together from various parts of the world.

Giving wide coverage to projects already underway with the Syrian side, Doubleday said "We are trying to bring in new information and skills to help develop the human resources in the country," adding that "Obviously, our greatest strength is in the English language, but we will be developing work in Information and Computer Technology (ICT), teacher development and human resource development within the public sector."

Doubleday added that these programs are a mixture of training and consultancy as can be seen in the ICT strategy paper that was developed with the Syrian authorities which has been followed with an E-Goverment seminar hosted with the Ministry of Communication. He said that human resource development can also been seen by the inward visits by UK university professors who are working in building the capacity of four Syrian universities.

As for future plans for cooperation, Doubleday said that "we will see some work on our premises with redesigning the Information Center so as to create a Knowledge and Learning Center, where we will have an Open Learning Center for teachers and students of English, and video conferencing facilities to help connect professionals in Syria and the UK."

Giving further impetus to boosting bilateral Syria- UK cultural relations, Doubleday said "We will also be developing more regional projects, where we will be connecting people in Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and Jordan with the UK with a more mutual agenda, to create opportunities for further understanding, not only in Syria but in the UK, alike."

Previous Stories:
  British envoy describes talks with al-Assad as constructive   (11/12/2003)
  Blair: we understand Israel's action, but we will not attack Syria   (10/16/2003)
  Syrian Mufti confers with British royal institute delegation   (10/4/2003)

Please add a link on your webiste pointing to ArabicNews.com and bookmark ArabicNews.com & subscribe to our daily email news bulletin.

Search