James Rubin Joins Prominent U.S. speakers at Global Education Conference in Bahrain

Notes and media contacts

About the speakers:

Dr Tony Wagner, has served as Co-Director of the Change Leadership Group (CLG) at the Harvard Graduate School of Education since its inception in 2000. An initiative of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, CLG is a "R&D" center that helps teams to be effective change leaders in schools and districts.

Dennis Shirley's educational works spans from the nitty-gritty micro-level of assisting beginning teachers to the macro-level of designing and guiding large-scale research and intervention projects for school districts, states, and non-profit agencies. He recently completed a study of the Alberta Initiative for School Improvement and its contribution to student achievements in Canada's highest achieving province.

Janice Jackson is a lecturer in Educational Leadership and Organizations at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and is the Senior Associate on the Wallace funded Executive Leadership Program for Educators. The initiative is a multi-year collaborative effort of the Harvard Business School, the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and the John F. Kennedy School of Government, working with district and state superintendents and their teams to help bring high quality teaching and learning to scale.

Nancy L. Ames has engaged in educational research and development, technical assistance, and policy and advocacy for more than 40 years. She serves as an independent consultant to the Education Development Center Inc (EDC), the College Board, and Edvantia, Inc.

Other leading education experts to address the Education Project include:
- Francois Barrault, former CEO of BT Global Services and head of BT Innovate
- Helen Pinnock, Education Advisor, Save the Children UK
- Bahram Bekhradnia, Director of the UK's Higher Education Policy Institute
- Angela Ho, Head of the Educational Development Centre at Hong Kong Polytechnic University
- Dan Shine, President 50x15 Foundation and Senior Advisor, Corporate Global Citizenship, World Economic Forum
- James Knight, President and CEO, Association of Canadian Community Colleges
- Professor Ralph Tabberer, Chief Schools Officer, GEMS
- Professor S. Gopinathan, Vice Dean, Centre for Research in Pedagogy and Practice, National Institute of Education, Singapore
- Dr Mona Mourshed, Partner, Middle East Office, McKinsey & Company
- Dr Shafeeq Ghabra, former president of the American University of Kuwait, Professor of Political Science at Kuwait University
- Dr Shirley Gatenio Gabel, Associate Professor, Graduate School of Social Science, Fordham University
- Dr Law Song Seng, Senior Advisor, ITE Education Services Private
- Kari Pitkanen, Director of Administration, Finnish National Board of Education
- Brian McKay Epp, Higher Education Assessment Consultant, Pearson
- Marina Rosenfeld, Pedagogical Director, Aprendiz
- Dr Taddy Blecher, CEO of the Community and Individual Development Association (CIDA) and CEO of the Maharishi Institute

About The Bahrain Economic Development Board (EDB)

The Bahrain Economic Development Board (EDB) is a dynamic public agency with an overall responsibility for formulating and overseeing the economic development strategy of Bahrain, and for creating the right climate to attract direct investment into the Kingdom.

The role of the Bahrain EDB is to provide leadership by uniting all of the Kingdom's shareholders through a unified vision, and to develop key strategies for growth. The Bahrain EDB also acts as a facilitator, helping all of Bahrain's stakeholders to understand and adopt the changes necessary for progress. In addition, the Bahrain EDB provides sound project management to ensure that all agreed reform initiatives are implemented in an effective and timely manner.

The Bahrain EDB is also responsible for attracting inward investment into Bahrain, and is focusing on six target economic sectors in which the Kingdom offers significant strengths. These are financial services, downstream industries, tourism, business services, logistics, and education and training.

For U.S. media inquiries, please contact:

Konstantin Shishkin, Weber Shandwick
Tel: 212.445.8462

For all other media inquiries, please contact:

Katie Bergius, Bell Pottinger
Tel: +44 (0)207 861 3105 / +44 (0)7979 701 689