Progress & Actions

Implementation in part, rest in progress

The Ministry of Education, beginning in November 2011, has been coordinating efforts with several national, regional and international organisations and specialised agencies to both update its curriculum and introduce new training for teachers and students.  To this end, a memorandum of understanding was signed between UNESCO International Board of Education and the Ministry of Education on 17 January 2012 allowing  the Ministry to receive help and advice on its reforms to school curriculums from UNESCO.  UNESCO will help develop programmes for governments schools, private schools, religious institutes and universities. The process has already begun and the first UNESCO delegation will arrive in Bahrain on 8 March.

The MoE has already held various workshops on human rights for children in December and January 2012 including:

• a workshop entitled “A Games Package for Human Rights”, administered by the Arab Network for Citizenship and Human Rights, held from 26 to 29 December 2011.
• Beginning in February 2012, the MoE plans to cooperate with UNDP in order to introduce an intensive training program for teachers on education for human rights.

The MoE is planning further training programmes in February and March 2012, including programmes for children.  These include:

• A workshop entitled “A Games Package for Human Rights” for 200 girl-scouts from 25^th to 29^th January 2012.
• Four training workshops on “differences” during February 2012.
• Two workshops on “dealing with each other” and “the value of dialogue” for in March 2012.

Furthermore, the University of Bahrain has approval from the National Curriculum Council to introduce a compulsory human rights and rule of law module for all students. The unit is being developed in conjunction with the University law school.