Teachers at the forefront of war against extremism

Education is one of the best means to win our ongoing war against terrorist and extremist ideologies wreaking havoc on various parts of the region and threatening many parts of the world.

This message was expressed by Her Majesty Queen Rania in her address to the second Teacher Skills Forum convened on the Dead Sea shores.

This is completely true, as education constitutes the best line of defence, and offence, against dark-age forces seeking only death and destruction.

The Queen summed it up eloquently in her address to the more than 1,000 teachers from Jordan and other Arab countries gathered at the forum by saying that the fight against destructive ideas is not only carried out by armies and weapons, but, most importantly, by teachers who have the power to abort evil ideologies, not allow them to see light of day and poison the minds of future generations.

That is a key ingredient to the anti-terror effort that Jordan has joined, along with other world powers. This special focus on the ideological element is actually the most demanding.

Teachers play a key role in enlightening generation after generation and building a country’s future.

Hence the focus on their role in the educational process through various means, one of which is the two-day forum convened at King Hussein Bin Talal Convention Centre, along with other initiatives that Jordan is carrying out.

This year, the conference saw the participation of educators and experts from other Arab countries, one year after its launch with the participation of only Jordanian teachers, 700 of them, in a bid to widen the scope of exchanging experiences and means of countering common challenges.

Unfortunately, Arab countries’ focus on education and mainly on the role of teachers has been diminishing over the past several decades mainly due to economic factors.

Queen Rania has been spearheading efforts in Jordan and elsewhere to tackle challenges facing the educational process in a bid to maximise Jordan’s investment in its future generations.

These commendable efforts managed to reap many fruits, but challenges abound, represented mainly in the lack of resources.

The government and other concerned authorities, in cooperation with friends from around the world, should keep in mind that supporting the educational process in the right manner, improving the lot of teachers and upgrading their professional standards not only serve the causes of the country’s development process, but are also a driving force in the ongoing war against terrorism, serving its long-term objective of defeating evil ideologies.