The World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) and the Education Development Institute (EDI), initiatives of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development (QF), have collaborated to launch a new programme.

‘Empowering Leaders of Learning’, a five-month programme, has been designed to build and develop leadership capabilities and accelerate improvements in teaching and learning in Qatar.

A total of 22 senior leaders from QF schools were invited to take part in the inaugural two-day session, which was hosted at the Qatar National Convention Centre and made possible in part by ExxonMobil.

The meeting was led by Dr Simon Breakspear, founder and CEO of LearnLabs; an Australia-based project that equips participants with strategies and tools to drive sustainable change in teaching practices.

Sheikha Noof Ahmed al-Thani, executive director of the Education Development Institute, said: “At EDI we believe that this programme provides a valuable opportunity for our Qatar Foundation school leaders to be supported in fostering improvements in teaching effectiveness, which will ultimately improve students’ learning. This initial session has provided a solid foundation for our school leaders to implement systematic improvements, and we are very excited to progress with this programme.”

Dr Asmaa E al-Fadala, director of Research at WISE, noted: “The ‘Empowering Leaders of Learning workshop presents the senior members of the participating schools with a unique opportunity to improve their leadership skills with the powerful support of their peers. These intensive sessions help our education leaders to both develop effective new approaches in teaching and achieve their goals for positive change in their classrooms.”

To prepare for the two-day intensive session, the participants were given online tasks, including readings and videos, and were asked to identify an existing “improvement problem” to work on during the training.

The programme is based on research in effective teaching strategies, behavioural design, and organisational learning. It is intended to integrate theory and practice with an explicit focus on supporting the improvement agenda that teams are already leading in their schools.

Over the coming months, participants will receive support through in-school coaching related to their unique change projects. They will take part in online ‘community of practice’ sessions to exchange ideas and share experiences with their peers. The participants will create a leadership community of support for change, and will receive on-going coaching.