Elham Palestine: An Inclusive Partnership for Systemic Change
Elham Palestine is the first – country-level – pilot developed by the L4WB Foundation and its partners. Elham is an Arabic word meaning ‘inspire’, and the genesis, design and structure of this programme is intended to celebrate those who are developing initiatives in the educational systems that can inspire other intrapreneurs.
Elham was created and operated in a national partnership that engaged education, health, ICT, civil society and children in a collective effort to enhance learning environments of Palestinian children to become more conducive to their holistic development and well-being.
In 2008, Elham was awarded in Helsinki the Global Best Award for an Innovative Partnership in Education. In 2012, Elham was awarded the Arab Achievement Award in Education. It has served as inspiration for other bottom-up and top-down approaches to systemic change.
After ten active years of operating, we are currently reviewing our activities to reorient them more closely to the L4WB principles, and to offer greater support in cultivating capacities for making decisions for individuals, groups and communities.
Partners: Palestinian Ministry of Education, Ministry of Health and UNRWA.
Promoting individual and community health
Inspired by the work in SDH, the Ministry of Health in Palestine has partnered with the L4WB Foundation to create Elham Health that parallels the Elham Education program, but engages the multiple stakeholders involved directly and indirectly in promoting individual and community health.
The program encourages the development and acknowledgment of innovative initiatives with the twin goals of increasing the number of people who benefit, and inspiring others to join together in new initiatives. Elham Health uses the Learning for Well-being principles as the process through which various individuals and groups work together on joint initiatives. The principles also provide the evaluation structure for selecting the initiatives to be honored and replicated at the national level.
The Project Nowadays
In early March (2020), when 6 young people and 6 adults from different NGOs and governmental institutions met for the first time in Ramallah to discuss ways they could work together.
Some of the ideas being discussed include:
- Working with young children
- Developing surveys jointly with universities
- Advocacy: involving religious institutions, media, and other potential partners
- Organizing trainings on Learning for Well-being approach for adults and children in Palestine
- Organizing a pilot 3-days Conference on Intergenerational Partnerships in Palestine
