AN all-girl Bahrain school has won a $1 million prize for the best reading initiatives for students in the Arab world.
The Al Eman Private School for Girls in Isa Town was declared winner in the school category at the second annual Arab Reading Challenge at a ceremony at Dubai Opera yesterday.
It beat five other finalists selected from 41,000 schools.
The contest was organised by the Dubai government and attended by UAE Vice-President, Prime Minister and Dubai Ruler Shaikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum.
The principal of the winning school takes home $100,000 of the prize money, with the school’s reading supervisor taking another $100,000 and the remaining $800,000 going to school funds.
A 17-year-old Palestinian girl, Afaf Raed, won the overall award in the challenge to read 50 Arabic books a year, and with it a prize of $150,000.
She finished ahead of the other regional winners that had already been announced: Hafsa Al Thunhani from the UAE; Shatha Al Twaiqi from Saudi Arabia; Sherif Saeed from Egypt; and Bushra Maison from Algeria.
The record-breaking number of participants is more than double the 3.5m last year. The 7.4m participants came from 41,000 schools in 25 Arab countries.
A panel of judges vote for winners based on the book summaries given by each participant, and even the audience at Dubai Opera yesterday voted.
During the ceremony, Shaikh Mohammed paid tribute to the parents of Fatima Ghulam, an Algerian school pupil who died in a car accident on her way to take part in her country’s reading challenge finals. He ordered that a library be built in her name.
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