Being an Economist and Livelihoods’ Development Specialist with over 15 years of extensive experience in economic empowerment, women and youth employment, entrepreneurship development, and humanitarian affairs, the rich experience and diversity of the Master’s Programme’s modules that were worked on, had strengthened my capacity to achieve and reach higher levels of expertise and acquire training/skills certificates. I gained the confidence to continue my training levels to become the first UNCTAD Master-Empretec Trainer in Palestine specialized in Entrepreneurship Skills Development, and managed to deliver several training workshops and courses in Jordan and Saudi Arabia targeting women.
Considering that my final Master thesis, titled Enhance Employment Opportunities for Young Women and Men through Cooperative Enterprises’’, the ILO office in Jerusalem provided me with the opportunity to continue working in this sector and become a Coop certified trainer in the management of agricultural cooperatives (MyCoop) and participated in conducting Co-op management training workshops.
Following graduation, I continued to extend my efforts in providing support and assistance to most vulnerable people, especially in rural areas and refugee camps, I effectively managed and monitored new projects: ’Women: generating incomes, creating new democracies’’ and ‘’ life-saving prevention and protection GBV services provision in Bedouin Communities.”
The Master program modules, in particular, project cycle management and law and human rights modules, contributed to enhancing my skills in the management of projects’ interventions and assessed the feasibility and sustainability of projects’ objectives related to women’s economic and legal rights. The added value of these particular modules improved my capacity to conduct a systemization of experience-assessment study on empowering women economically and socially in the Jordan Valley through micro income generating projects’.
Taking the advantage of this specific master programme, and gaining knowledge in the field of institutional economic development issues and analysis, I had the opportunity to work and provide technical support in Local Economic Development (LED) as a LED advisor to the Palestinian Ministry of Local Government and Municipalities.
The ITCILO-Management of Development Master programme reflected on my career path and helped me to be more completive in today’s era of globalization and current refugee crises. Be aware of legal context for development and human rights-based approach, It provided me with the opportunity to expand my own field of view & awareness on enabling legal context for development, and helped me to enter the UNHCR International Roster on Refugee Self-Reliance and Livelihoods Development.
The core faculty and guest speakers of the programme, along with the unique methodology of combining theory, practical experience and the interdisciplinary approach, in addition to the social and friendly environment at the campus, helped me to build a strong basis for international professional networks, and made me feel that “attending this program was one of my best decision I’ve ever made, it had such a positive impact on my career and social life.
- Written by Madmouj Rawand
