Dear %%Recipient name%%,

Happy New Year!

We wish all our trustees, project partners, scholars, friends and supporters a peaceful and prosperous 2009.  Don’t forget to keep us up to date with your news!

Artists in Schools celebration



Since October 2005 the Foundation has been supporting the British Museum’s Artists in Schools project, part of the Arab World Education Programme.  A celebratory event was held on 16 December at Bristol’s City Museum and Art Gallery marking the achievements of the Bristol schools involved in the project.  It was attended by students, teachers and parents.
Read more about the project here

Above: an 'oud player provides musical entertainment at the event.

Child Development Programme

The Foundation has recently begun supporting two new projects.  The Community Based Rehabilitation (CBR) Programme, established by Al Khaldiyyah Society for Special Education (KASE) in the north of Jordan, helps children and their families to manage physical and/or mental disabilities.  Services offered include occupational and physical therapy, speech therapy and special education.
Read more here

Friends of Birzeit University (FoBZU), Palestine, has set up a project that will enable child protection counsellors to provide effective services for children and their families.  Twenty child protection counsellors from across the West Bank will be trained to work together effectively with other professionals (education, health, police, courts and specialist services) in order to protect children. The trainees will be awarded Diplomas in Family Counselling (Child Protection) from Birzeit University.
Read more here


Help us fulfill our mission to bring positive and lasting change to the lives of children and young people in the Middle East. Any contribution, however small, makes a real difference.


Know someone who might be interested in our work?

Drawing Competition Winners

As usual we received so many excellent entries from our project partners for the annual drawing competition that choosing a winner proved to be extremely difficult. The design eventually chosen as the Foundation’s seasonal greetings card, pictured right, is by Ghazzala Mohammed Saïd, 13, from the Special Education Institute for the Deaf in Aleppo, Syria. It is entitled ‘Nature’.

The other winners were:

Second prize – Luzanne (13), from Association Najdeh, Lebanon

Third prize – Walaa (15) from Enlighten, Palestine

Fourth prize – Yahya (9) from Al Majd Association for the Rehabilitation and Training of Persons with Special Needs, Syria

Fifth prize – Mohammed (17), from Childcare Charitable Association, Jordan

The drawing competition is held annually for the children and young people who participate in the projects supported by our Child Development Programme.

Alumni News

Faten Talhami (MSc Manipulative Physiotherapy, University of Brighton, 2006) has been busy since returning to Palestine.  She has been teaching physiotherapy courses at Bethlehem University and has taken part in two international conferences: the French Physiotherapy Association’s Conference in France and the Sixth International Congress of the Order of Physiotherapists in Lebanon where she gave a lecture on ‘The Importance of Qualitative Research in Physiotherapy Practice’.  She is currently the assistant manager of the Sheikh Jarah Physiotherapy Department, where she treats patients with neuromusculoskeletal disorders.

Since her graduation Lucy Semaan (MA Maritime Archaeology, University of Southampton, 2007) has been involved with several exciting projects, including the Lake Mareotis research project in Alexandria, Egypt and the excavation of Leftaya Byzantine village in Syria.  In September she presented a paper on ‘Ship Construction in Antiquity’ at the Tropis symposium organised by the Hellenic Institute for the Preservation of Nautical Tradition and of Ancient and Medieval Alexandrian Studies in Athens, and in November joined a Greek team in Alexandria for an underwater excavation.  She has also worked on a visual survey of several sites that are threatened by divers and looting off Beirut and the northern coast of Lebanon.  Lucy is Lebanon's only diving maritime archaeologist.

Rashed Al-Nasa’a (MSc Environmental Engineering and Design, UCL, 2007) has become the first architect in Jordan to acquire Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) accreditation.  On his return to Amman Rashed's company immediately put him to work leading the project team for the Canadian Chancery Building.  He has also set up a Green Building Committee and taken part in various conferences and workshops about green building and sustainable design. 



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Saïd Foundation, 4th Floor, 54 Bartholomew Close, London, EC1A 7HP Tel: 00 44 20 7367 9910 Fax: 00 44 20 7637 9919 / 00 44 20 7726 6837  admin@saidfoundation.org
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