American Studies InstituteAin Sukhna, Egypt January 2005

Slideshow Seven:A Visit to an Egyptian School

A Joint Project of Binational Fulbright Commission-Egypt

and

James Madison UniversityOffice of International Programs

Lee Sternberger, Principal Investigator

Project Directors Noha El Gindi (Fulbright)

Lorie Merrow (JMU)

JMU FacultyPhilip Bigler, Steve Reich

Elizabeth Chew (Monticello) Mark Facknitz, Howard Lubert

Fulbright AssistantsMariam

Laila HusseinJMU Student Assistant

Bareza Rasoul

The Ma’ady Experimental SchoolMa’ady, Cairo

One of our participants, Shawky Allam, invited us to the school where he teaches, the Ma’ady Experimental School, which

houses 1300 students from first to last year, primary through secondary school. Experimental schools are public schools

at which some new ideas are tried out. They often have better funding and better teachers than regular public

schools. Ma’ady is an upper middle class area of Cairo.

I visited classes in the Prep (Middle School age) and Secondary (High School age) sections. Their English was excellent.

Children in all Egyptian schools start English at age 6.

Each class in this Ma’ady school has about 50 students

The students were welcoming and involved, and they asked excellent questions.

Break Time

Our participant, Shawky, on the right

A visit to the

Agricultural Museum

Something like a museum of Natural History with special exhibits on agriculture

Acting as tour guides, Mohamed Hanafi,

(an ASI participant,) and his wife Maaly

Many interesting specimens of Egyptian wildlife, especially birds

A symbol of Egypt, the goddess of

agriculture