Learning Experience Design &
Curriculum Development

Highlighted Project 1

Al-Shehab Community Learning Center, Egypt

This work entailed:

Consulting for Al-Shehab for comprehensive community development organization which operates across Egypt's squatter areas to empower women and children. The consultancy involved creating a community learning center for the lifelong learning, civic education and social and emotional well-being of the children of the area to lead in return to also support women's economic empowerment.
The work I undertook involved:
- Meetings with Al-Shehab team to refine the scope of the project, define the problem and the needs
- Needs assessment using focus groups employing action methods techniques and sample learning workshops with the local community: parents, children and families workshops
- Developing the center's:
  - theory of change,
  - pedagogical philosophy (agile education that uses principles of critical, liberatory, social-justice based and democratic education),
  - community involvement strategy
  - social impact theory and metrics
  - governance and operations manual using agile project management tools
- Developing curricula and assessment methods for different programs for both children and parents
- Co-designing the learning center spatially with what fits the learning needs and the pedagogical philosophy
- Recruiting, training, onboarding and field supervision of learning facilitators for the center
Tools and methods used: human centered design, socio-metric methods for community needs assessment, theory of change development, experiential learning, community arts methods (theater, storytelling, drama, collective poetry and singing), action methods, liberatory pedagogies, agile education tools for learning and center management. See facilitation & training page for more details.
As a result/fruition: I recruited and trained 15 facilitators, developed a 10-module curriculum for children ages 7- 9 and 10-12 years old and for parents. The center works with 100 children annually.
The project was conducted for one year while the center continues to operate until present.

Other Sample Projects

Pioneers of Education

In collaboration with Education Square, Egypt

I co-founded and designed the learning experience for a 12-week annual school for changemakers in Education. This involved:

set the learning agenda, pedagogy, themes, topics, assessments and graduation projects outline
invited speakers & planned field visits and skills workshops. Topics included: theories of learning, social-justice education, innovative learning models, future trends in education, educator identity and leadership, social entrepreneurship for education, history and local context
coached pioneers on their social action graduation projects and personal reflection for growth
facilitated community building activities across every cohort
taught on topics of critical and progressive education
Fruition: five cohorts (5 years) have graduated with multiple education entrepreneurship projects and a connected alumni network

Self-Organized Learning Environments (SOLE) Facilitators and Founders Program

with Mesahat: Liberating Learning, Egypt

I co-founded and designed the learning experience for a 6-months journey that is done annually. I also taught in the program.

The program is directed at teachers, non-formal education facilitators, alternative schooling parents and aspiring founders or conveners of community learning spaces.

Topics included: self-directed and democratic education, agile education tools, theories of learning, learning experience design, facilitation skills, social-justice education, educator identity and leadership, history and local context, designing a SOLE from planning to execution
Components included: learning modules, supervised practical hours of facilitation, a mentored self-directed learning journey, a personal research project, connections to local and global projects for exchange and inspiration (local and virtual field visits), immersive residential experiences and peer learning groups
Fruition: the program was conducted for 4 cohorts (4 years) working with 150+ facilitators and founders in Egypt with a connected alumni network. Participants went on to found their own spaces and integrate the learnings and philosophies into their work be it civil society organizations, movements or classrooms. I also conducted the experience once for Agile Learning Centers in Greece.

Roots & A.G.I.L.E Living

in collaboration with: School Without Frontiers, Greece

Skills Focus
intentional living, adaptable living to changing global conditions, intentional culture creation, non-hierarchical governance models and decision making, explicit culture tools like digital storytelling, adaptive leadership, community organizing, self-organized learning, eco-construction, permaculture design, trauma-sensitive facilitation and learning, facilitation skills, democratic education, social justice education, agile education tools, project prototyping

Roots

A 2-week inter-generational learning journey with families and young people from around the world centering intentional community living and creating self-organized autonomous environments. The experience was held in Greece at an intentional living eco-project.

I designed and co-facilitated the experience.

A.G.I.L.E Living

A 2-week learning journey with youth who are community workers, activists and changemekers from around the world around Adaptable, Global, Intentional/Inter-connected Living and Empowerment (A.G.I.L.E). Conducted between 5 partner organizations across the Mediterranean. The experience was held in Greece on a regenerative agroforestry project.

I designed and co-facilitated the experience.

Taking the Humanities on the Road (THoR): Collaborative Learning in Decolonizing History and Anthropology
In Collaboration with University of Bern, Switzerland

A higher education learning and research project inquiring into decolonizing the disciplines of history and anthropology, to bring more epistemic equity into knowledge production.
It took place over 3 years as semester long experiences between students in higher education from the Global North and the Global South
I was both a co-designer of the experience/project lead and a research participant
Produced written and artistic contemplations from this collaborative research and learning experience.
The project was conducted between the University of Bern, Switzerland and the Cairo Institute of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Egypt

Education in Transformation: An Inter-disciplinary Social Science-based Seminar Series

A 2-months online seminar series in the wake of COVID-19 connecting critical social science researchers in education to practitioners, educators, development field professionals, alternatives' founders, social innovators and government people aiming at popularizing social science research.
Topics ranged across disciplines from history, political economy, sociology, anthropology, public policy, and urban philosophy of education.
This was a collective inquiry into the state of education and its transformation particularly in times of transition and crisis in the context of COVID-19
I co-designed the topics, invited the speakers, moderated the discussion forum and co-moderated the sessions
Seminars were held weekly with an online forum discussion space for participants