2019 Annual Conference

Community, Minority, and Non-Formal Education

Concurrent Session (45 minutes)

This session is about women adult education movement in Iran. In this session the presentation covers the history of the movement and the professionalization of women in education in Iran. The author covers the growth and development of "Patriotic Women's League of Iran" or "Society of Patriotic Women" (1922- present).

Adult educators, scholars and educators who are interested in international education, history of adult education movement, women movement, and feminism in Middle East. During this presentation they will be educated on the important role that politics plays in education in Iran and how these two elements are not independent from one another. Since they are many stereotypes toward women in Middle East, this session would be great opportunity for those who are interested to know more about how adult education has been changed many lives for many decades. 

It is important to emphasize that the era in which this group has shaped is crucial. The goal of this presentation is to show how women in Iran, which was very conservative, back then, started an educational group, which later on changed to a feminist movement in education in this country. Audience will learn about the challenges these women have been through and despite of these challenges they promote their program nation wide.

Women in Middle East have been involved in the field of adult education for decades. Specially in developing countries such as Iran women made a huge role to develop programs in which help women empowerment in a form that is necessary to introduce to western culture. The impact these women had on adult education on Iran specially for less fortunate women in society is crucial. In this presentation, the crucial role of culture is constantly emphasized. The challenges these women went through and how they find innovative solution for each of them within the limitation they had is another layer. Annually there are many educational program have been developed by different organizations world wide for third world countries which majority of them fail or never been completed. This paper would be helpful for educators who are designing programs for different cultures. In addition that would help them to gain better understanding over the factor of culture in education.

Lecture with limited slides. Descriptive narration of research study method and findings, with context for uadience to understand the culture of study. (35 minutes) 

Q&A from audience. (10 minutes)