March 5th, 2008

MSE Research Associate Completes Muslim Gender-Issue Research

Sabbah's study focuses on gender relationships within the classroom

Those who are unfamiliar with Islamic culture are sometimes puzzled by the Islamic view of gender. However, closer examination shows that Muslim values closely parallel those cherished by most Christian-Americans: that men and women are equal.

Hilda Sabbah, research associate at the Positive Behavior Support Initiative, a devout Muslim, recently completed a doctoral study regarding gender issues in Islamic schools. Her inspiration for the research came as she noticed certain disparities between the treatment of boys and girls in American school systems. She resolved to research those same issues in Islamic schools to see what kind of correlations she would find.

Originally she and her doctoral chair, Vance Randall, planned to conduct the study in Gaza and the West Bank near Jerusalem—Sabbah’s native land. However, civil unrest and violence made such a study difficult and dangerous. “It was impossible to go and collect any kind of data or to do a study,” Randall said. “It was just way too dangerous.” Instead, Sabbah performed her research with several private Islamic schools in the Midwestern United States. The specific goal of the research was to observe the differences between gender issues in private Islamic schools vs. US public schools.

In her study Sabbah sought plausible explanations of how boys and girls in Islamic schools interact. “The idea behind the study was that education in the United States has issues between boys and girls—how they are treated in schools by the teachers,” Sabbah said. “Islam as a religion gives equal rights for men and women, especially education, so the question was if there are any gender issues among the students in an American-Muslim context.”

The study consisted of interviews, classroom observations, and work groups. Sabbah observed the children and noted their behavior during class. She focused her studies particularly on behaviors specific to gender: teacher preferences, female to female bias, male to male bias, interaction of male students with female students and vice versa.

Sabbah found that Islamic schools deal with the same general issues and problems as American public schools: Male teachers are more responsive and tend to favor female students, female teachers tend to favor male students, etc. “But there was something unique to the Islamic schools,” Sabbah explained. “Gender plays a role on an institutional level in Islamic schools. Their religion requires them to separate boys from girls, so they are taught separately in different rooms. Because the school didn’t have many students, they arranged the classrooms differently. Boys sat in the front separated by two empty rows, and the girls sat in the back. There was a gender issue, but it was part of the religion, and the boys, girls, and teachers accepted it.”

Sabbah was recently hired as the principal of the Iqra Academy of the Islamic Society of Greater Salt Lake in Salt Lake City, Utah. She looks forward to teaching the students there, particularly her own five children, all of whom will be attending the academy.

5 March 2008

Source: http://education.byu.edu/news/2008_features/hilda_sabbah.html

 

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February 27th, 2008

Dear Respectful Parents,
A friendly reminder that our instruction day ends:

• Monday - Thursday at 3:00 p.m.
• Fridays at 1:00 p.m.

We have noticed that a few children are left here way beyond these hours. We encourage all parents to be at least 5 - 10 minutes early so all students will be picked-up on time, as explained in the Parent Handbook given to all parents during registration.

Late Pick-up Fee $5.00* per incident/per student (*late fee will be charged for each student that is picked up late when no arrangements have been made. The late fee is for the 1st hour, followed by $3.00/hr for each hour following.)

After 3:15 p.m. Charges will occur.

Policy effective and implemented Monday, March 3, 2008.
Any questions or concerns. Please don't hesitate to contact the Principal or Pam.

We highly appreciate all our children and parents cooperation. Let us all work for the best interest of our children.

Principal,
Hilda Sabbah

February 7th, 2008

Asalamu Alaikum Parents:

My name is Dr. Hilda Yacoub Sabbah, originally from Jerusalem-Palestine.  I started as the new principal at Iqra last Friday, February 1st.  I tried my best to meet most of you personally when you dropped off your children or picked them up.  If I did not have the chance to meet you yet, please feel welcomed to stop by my office when you have a chance.

I’d like to share a little bit of my educational background and experience with you.  I completed my masters and doctoral degrees from Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, in educational leadership.  I’ve worked for BYU for two years and am currently still teaching a class there.  I teach educational research classes as well consult on the positive behavior support initiative managed by BYU and the Provo and Nebo school districts.  My involvement in this initiative has allowed me to work directly with different public schools ranging from elementary to middle and secondary schools.  I’ve worked closely with principals and teachers in these schools and together we’ve successfully applied different intervention programs to help struggling students.  I’ve also worked closely with the leadership preparation program at BYU that trains future principals and assistant principals.  In addition, I also have few years of teaching experience in Palestine as a science teacher for both elementary and secondary schools and was also an assistant principal for a year. 

I am very excited to be at Iqra and to work closely with all your children in different classes. I was pleasantly delighted to see all of them pray, read the Qur’an and speak Arabic to me.  I am still learning about every single child and his or her needs in order to provide them the best education we can as principal, teachers, and staff at Iqra. We cannot achieve this alone. We are always looking to you for your support and involvement in your children’s education.  Please take the time to talk to me and your child’s teacher from time to time to check on their performance and what is needed to enhance it and make it better. I also encourage parents to come and sit in your child’s class whenever possible even if it’s only for half an hour. This can be achieved by coordinating the time with me and your child’s teacher so we can choose the best times and days for your involvement. Our parent-teacher conference is coming soon in March, and we are excited to talk to you about the wonderful things your children have been achieving and work with you on some aspects to make them better.

As the new principal, I intend to work with all parents and staff to continue to improve Iqra for our children.  I would like to encourage the following rules and guidelines and am requesting your assistance and support in enforcing and communicating this to our children.  I hope that you will take the time to review these with your child as we are going to go over them with all the children in the coming days. We can not do it all without your help. Thank you very much in advance for your support and everything you are doing. These important rules and guidelines are:

• All children are expected to be at the school no later than 8:15 am everyday (with exception to Pre-K) with exceptions of some days with bad snow storms. I’d like to start the day with the assembly before 8:30 am and talk to the children. All teachers are expected to start the classes at 8:30 am. We do not want any of the children to miss any instructions any day.
• All children need to wear nice and tidy uniform during the week (Monday-Thursday). Friday is still a free day.
• All children need to bring a healthy lunch everyday. Healthy children perform better in school. They also need it for their growth. We provide the milk, but they need a healthy lunch that includes one kind of vegetable or fruit if possible and some proteins. The teachers will help the children warm up their daily lunches.
• All children need to be picked up and dropped off by their parents or guardian.  We are not allowing the children to run out to the cars because we have many cars in the parking lot and we are concerned for their safety.
• Islam and all cultures are big on hygiene. We emphasis this to the children as well.  Please make sure that your children have clean clothes every day, short nails, pony tails for girls with long hair, and no nail polish or make up.
• All movies will be reviewed and approved by the principal and teacher prior to showing it in class. We encourage only educational movies to be shown in school and short in length, no more than 30 min.
• All children are expected to use proper and polite language in school and all the time.  We are working with the students on their social skills of saying “please”, “thank you”, “excuse me”, and other polite and proper skills they need to use every day.  No foul language is allowed inside the classrooms or in the school premises.

Thank you all parents for your support and for trusting us to work with your children. I am very excited to be at Iqra and am looking forward to working with you and the staff to continue to improve, develop, and establish the best education experience for our children.  Insyah Allah we can make our school to be one of the best schools in the area.

Jazakum Allah Khairan All.

Dr. Hilda Y. Sabbah
Iqra Academy Principal