Asmaa Muammar, a Palestine refugee teacher at Fukhari Elementary Girls school in Gaza, won the Gold Medal for the Global Creative Women Award (GCWA) 2021, after passing four tests with distinction.

The GCWA is an initiative of Global Trainer Academy to encourage skilled women to present their talent. “This was amazing experience that empowered me and gave me a push forward towards improving the teaching methods that I follow.” Asmaa Said.

Asmaa devised a strategy, through which she aims to raise her students towards creativity and glory “I put all my focus on letting the students unleash their inner light and get out of their comfort zone. I don’t ask them for solutions, instead I ask them to get to the heart of the problem through which they will reach the solution.” she said in a feature published by UNRWA.

 “UNRWA seeks to create a self-confident, creative and innovative generation who is capable of facing and overcoming challenges. After looking closely at UNRWA vision and goals, I largely believed that they were compatible with my ideas and goals”, Asmaa said.

The UNRWA Education programme in Gaza faces many challenges of unstable political and social environment, hard economic and social situation, and poverty and siege. The average class size of UNRWA schools in Gaza is 41 students; an additional concern to the internal and external challenges that pose a risk to the commitment and motivation of education staff, as well as to the quality of UNRWA education services.

In spite of these barriers to education, Palestine refugee children, teachers and their families continue to value education and strive for excellence. This is also thanks to UNRWA schools, supported by the EU, that provide a sense of security, stability and normalcy despite the circumstances these children live in.

Asmaa described the added challenges she has to overcome as a women: “an employed woman has to bear additional burdens, and this was the biggest challenge for me, I tried to achieve harmony between my work and my family, and to succeed as a mother and a teacher. I have tamed all odds and challenges in order to reach success, all my children rank first in their classes, and my oldest daughter, Haneen, is studying dentistry, after obtaining a grade point average of 95.4 in high school”.

As for the future, Asmaa said she believes that despite all the difficult circumstances imposed on the Palestine refugees, the teachers and students are able to adapt and overcome difficulties in various fields.