Al Mada is keen on establishing partnerships to identify common ground among the private, public and civil society. Partnerships focus on the many areas where private actors and public institutions can engage in positive and productive relationships, such as poverty reduction, health, education and community development. By sharing knowledge, Al Mada and partner organizations can improve the impact and quality of their work. Effective cross-sectoral partnerships can make it possible to overcome challenges that are too difficult or complex for one organization or sector to address alone and make efforts more effective by combining resources and competencies in innovative ways.

Al Mada collaborates with a number of partners in bringing music therapy and arts-based community development to Palestine. Over the past few years, Al Mada has been building on and expanding these partnerships, while networking to explore potential partnerships with other organizations and institutions.

                           WFD: Main Donor

WFD is major donor and co-founder of Al-Mada. WFD, the German World Peace Service (Weltfriedensdienst) is a non-governmental grassroots organization that supports grassroots projects in Africa, Latin America and Palestine through strong partnerships based on solidarity and provides consultancy to its partners at all technical, administrative and financial levels. Through its international partner projects, WFD engages in the fields of civil conflict management, human rights, women’s rights and economic development, education and training, and agricultural activities which preserve natural resources. WFD typically provides long-term consultancy to projects that seek to encourage victims of injustices to find ways to express the suffering they experienced and thus move towards healing through creative means.

WFD has a long-standing relationship of solidarity with Palestine, which started in 1968 when the organization started to support a women’s embroidery collective in Kfar Na’me near the West Bank village of Bil’in. While this partnership continues to this day, WFD now focuses on strengthening Palestinian civil society through supporting Palestinian NGOs that provide arts-based and psychosocial intervention.
 

                     Ministry of Education and Higher Education

The Ministry of Education and Higher Education of the Palestinian National Authority is the branch of the Palestinian government in charge of managing the education in the Palestinian territories.

As a unique experience and the first of its kind, Al Mada has involved music teachers in its training sessions after assessment results indicated that regular teachers may not have the opportunity to interact with each student individually, due to their workload and number of students per class, in addition to other obligations. Music teachers were found to be the ones who are able to work closely with students and assist in identifying the main causes of learning difficulties - especially as there are many symptoms that are caused by underlying psychological or social issues.

Al Mada has been working with the Ministry of Education to encourage the use of music therapy in schools and, alongside the Ministry of Education and UNRWA, has been running an intensive training program for educators, social workers and counselors.

Another important project that both parties have agreed to pilot and extend at a later stage, involves promoting inclusive education through music therapy, where training is provided to a group of special educators and counselors, music teachers and music counselors.

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                                        UNRWA

UNRWA (the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East) provides assistance, protection and advocacy for some 4.7 million registered Palestine refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and the occupied Palestinian territory, pending a solution to their plight.

Since 2009, UNRWA has been working alongside Al Mada in running an intensive training program for educators, social workers and counselors and is currently collaborating on a number of other activities. To date, 63 trainees have graduated in "Introduction to Music Therapy", amongst which ten were selected to attend "Advanced Training in Music Therapy" to allow for more in-depth comprehension and improved application of training.

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                    Ministry of Health

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