The School Construction, Rehabilitation and Equipment project of the Belgian Development Cooperation builds new schools in the Palestinian Territory. The focus lies on quality education through environment and child friendly school designs, while experimenting with innovative and eco-sustainable solutions.  

In order to raise awareness, the project also invests in capacity building for engineers of the ministry of education and higher education, the directorates, school headmasters and teachers, students and communities. Special attention is paid to interactions between schools and communities, to gender and to energy efficiency and other environment-related aspects.  

One recent achievement in terms of environmental awareness, is the translation, supported by the Belgian Development Cooperation,  of the book “An Evaluation Study of the Green Governmental Schools in Palestine “ of Basma Saadeh from Arabic to English.  

The book is divided into three main chapters. In a first part, the book gives an overview of the evolution of governmental schools in terms of student numbers and architectural development from 1994 until 2014.  

The second part of the book is dedicated to green schools, including aspects such as the sustainability of the school location, water use reduction, efficiency use of energy, used materials and resources as well as the learning environment. 

In the final part, an analysis was conducted of a sample of prominent governmental school buildings that can be classified as ‘green’. The study discusses the success of the attempts made by the ministry to achieve the specifications and standards of green school building based on the international standards and specifications. It also identifies the future potential in this domain.  

The writer, Basma Saadeh studied architectural engineering at the An Najah University. She currently works as an architectural designer and developer at the general directorate of buildings in the Ministry of Education and Higher Education situated in Ramallah.  

More information is available here: http://tinyurl.com/jmslch4