IIIT Senior Researcher Presents at Geneva Consortium

On July 2, 2018 Dr. Ilham Nasser, Senior Researcher at IIIT on the Advancing Education in Muslim Societies project (AEMS) presented a paper at the Consortium on “Strengthening Families to Nurture Values and Spirituality: Evidence, Challenges and Opportunities convened by Arigatu International in Geneva, Switzerland. The event brought together civil society organizations and academia to collaborate on finding ways to engage various religious communities to end violence against children. The event included representatives from Permanent Missions to the UN in Geneva, social and religious leaders, academicians and other participants at the launch of the Consortium.

At the two-day working meeting at Chateau de Bossey, Dr. Ilham Nasser presented a paper titled. “What evidence does research suggest on the impact of spirituality on children and ways they relate to others: Where are the gaps?” She touched on the effects of nurturing values and spirituality on child development and the capacity to relate to others, particularly in early years. After this, Dr. Nasser introduced the work done at IIIT through the Advancing Education in Muslim Societies (AEMS) project which is exploring connections between empathy, forgiveness, moral reasoning, and community connectedness in twenty Muslim majority societies and ways religiosity and sense of belonging may play a role in enhancing those connections.