# Call to Action: Grassroots Initiatives Bridging Research and Real-World Impact in Gaza
## Who we are
We are a 100% volunteer-led collective working at the intersection of education, research, and community support.
Please consider following our event annoucements on [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/sail.initiatives/)
Our milestones to date:
- Hosted a [virtual cocreation workshop](https://sail-initiatives.github.io/ccw/) with participants from Australia, Canada, Finland, Indonesia, Japan, Palestine, Norway, and beyond.
- **English Empowerment Program** (EEP): Providing free weekly online English *empowering** lessons to Gazan teens since August 2025 over 28+ consecutive weeks
- Conducted over 90+ research meetings with steering committee members and research volunteers from Finland, Indonesia, Japan, and the United Kingdom
- Contributed over 1000+ volunteer hours, leading to our first research article presented at [Muslims in ML Workshop at NeurIPS 2025](Muslims-in-ML-2025.md)
- Learn more in our [visual briefs](https://tinyurl.com/SAIL-initiatives)
*Empowering...
- We are adopting a train-a-trainer model with an emphasis on conversational English
- Our free sessions are carefully designed by experienced educators:
- ๐๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ฒ๐ณ๐๐น ๐ฐ๐๐ฟ๐ฎ๐๐ถ๐ผ๐ป: To maintain a psychologically safe learning environment, we intentionally avoided potentially sensitive topics such as travel and celebrations that might evoke difficult emotions
- ๐ฆ๐ผ๐ผ๐๐ต๐ถ๐ป๐ด: We center our lessons on calming themes as music and art, fostering connection to studentsโ daily realities while honouring their personal resilience, creativity, and growing confidence alongside their English development
- Inclusive approach, including:
- Offline homework activities
- Integration of trauma-coping strategies using color, art, crafts, sketching, and paired picture-book readings
## About Us
We have multiple WhatsApp-based communities connecting our volunteers to educators and learners from North Gaza and the West Bank. Given constrained resources and limited volunteer capacity, we intentionally design initiatives that are **manageable, sustainable, and discreet**.
Our focus is on delivering **practical, timely support** to marginalized children by:
- Sharing STEAM educational resources that local educators can readily use
- Offering free Zoom-based English learning sessions through our English Empowerment Program
In parallel, we connect global advocates and researchers through **unfunded, community-driven research initiatives** that prioritize ethical collaboration and real-world impact.
## 2026 & Beyond
### [English Empowerment Program](EEP.md)
- We strive to keep the program running; please contact email if you could volunteer 1 hour/ week
### Virtual Workshops
*Workshops to witness and experience global solidarity*
- 2026: Please email us to propose a topic, time and date of our next workshop at ccw4gaza@gmail.com
- 2026: Feb 14 [Kullaj-Making Virtual Co-Cooking Workshop](2026Kullaj)
- 2025: June 21, 22, 28, 29 [virtual cocreation workshop](https://sail-initiatives.github.io/ccw/)
### Translation + image captioning + cultural preservation projects
- Community-centered projects focused on accessibility, storytelling, and cultural continuity
- More details to come
### Empowering Non-Palestinians Through Social Good Projects
- Addressing inequity through AI-assisted interventions
- Inviting researchers and practitioners to co-develop mobile applications for marginalized communities around the world, e.g. Sudan, Congo
