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Professor Jawad Fatayer, President Assistant for Graduate Affairs at An-Najah University, participated in the honoring celebration of the first and second level students who took part in the “Awaken the Genius in Your Child” program which was organized at Hisham Hijjawi College of Technology in Nablus.

Attendees to the celebration included: Mrs. Lamis Alami, Palestinian Minister of Education and Higher Education, Executive Director of the “Awaken the Genius in Your Child” Program Dr. Abdel Fattah Al-Sartawi from the UCMAS Educational Institution, Dr. Ghassan Hilo, Dean of Hisham Hijjawi College of Technology, Mr. Yaseen Dwaikat, Representative of the Chamber of Commerce in Nablus, Mrs. Sahar Akoubeh, Director of Education in Nablus, in addition to representatives of Nablus Governorate, school headmasters and students’ families.

In the celebration, Professor Fatayer delivered a speech in which he spoke about the characteristics of the human being which are clear through his ability to learn and the structure of his brain which sets him apart from other creatures. He also explained the necessity to provide the best social environment and suitable psychological conditions for the upbringing of the human being.

Furthermore, Professor Fatayer described the importance of the age period (4-12 years old) which is considered as a very critical one in the life of a human being; it is the vital stage in the formation of mind and personality. He also said that the family, the school and the media should target their efforts towards building this personality.

He also praised the USMAS program and described it as a modern and genius vision and expressed the University’s readiness to embrace and support such programs.

Mrs. Alami delivered a speech in which she explained further about the Program and said that the Program works on preparing the children (age 4-12) both mentally and psychologically in order to activate and stimulate brain cells in an early age. The Program targets children of the age 4-12 because it is in this stage that the brain of the child is undergoing immense development and growth. It works on developing the mental skills of the child using consecutive mathematical calculations which would help him innovate and create. Such practices also helps the child acquire a number of personal skills such as controlling mental concentration, memory enhancement, and the development of observation, analysis, composing, imagination and visualization skills.

She added: “We emphasize the importance of later and continuous follow-up to maintain performance level among children and to enrich the knowledge, emotional and human side of them as possible so that the integration of mental abilities with the educational and cultural level is achieved.

Moreover, she highlighted the scale of benefit that the UCMAS offers through this program and said that such program is considered a vital tool used to raise the level of competence with respect to academic achievement and mental upgrade. This program, Mrs. Alami added, is an example of the kind of programs that the Ministry of Education in Palestine implements together with its partners whose aim is to develop higher-order thinking skills, in addition to self-learning, critical thinking, cooperative learning and others.

Finally, she emphasized the Ministry’s concern with developing the educational infrastructure in Palestine through adopting new approaches in education and through developing the teaching staff working at the different educational institutions. Such projects aim to apply the cooperative learning approach instead of the traditional one in an attempt to bring positive change to the educational field.

Dr. Sartawi said that the graduation of this year class points out the Ministry’s deep concern with sustainable development and investment in children. He also said that the “Awaken the Genius in Your Child” program is a universal one and exits in more than 50 countries, including 13 Arab countries. He added that the students have benefited a lot from this program as they became able to accomplish 80 mathematical calculations in less than 8 minutes both with high speed and astonishing concentration.

He finally praised the great achievement that the students have made after joining the program and congratulated their families.