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Birzeit University, Right to Education Campaign

right2edu.birzeit.edu

Birzeit University, the leading Palestinian higher educational institution, has often found itself targeted during the course of Israel's military occupation of the West Bank, now in its 37th year. The institution was closed by military order for much of the 1980s, "for security reasons". In the post-Oslo phase, Israeli checkpoints and closures of towns and villages around the university have made it difficult to function.

The Right To Education campaign site, redesigned and relaunched in April 2004, offers a variety of news and information and is intended to raise international awareness of the university's situation and generate activism to ensure the academic calendar continues unimpeded.

Design Notes

Above: Site title bar.

The design of the site's title bar was composed from several elements. The black silhouette of the tank next to a barbed wire barricade and the approaching students are a stark reminder of the reality that students have to navigate in order to get to the university campus. The tank profile was taken from a photograph by Palestinian photojournalist Musa Al-Shaer.

The student figures are adapted from the international road sign motif for school crossings. The houses that form the background of the title bar were created from a photograph of Birzeit village, the closest population area to the university campuses and home for many students.

The red dusty feel of the background overlay evokes the hot, dusty journey that students, faculty and staff must make across the key Surda roadblock that required two taxis and hours of delays at the times that the crossing was open.

Categories are searchable by date and a familiar Google search is found in the Advanced Search options. All pages have an E-mail this Page function, article pages have an additional Print this Page function, and all or any of the content sections can be syndicated to encourage visitor redistribution of information from the site.

The site is generated by a content management system that the client maintains in-house.

Visit the site at: right2edu.birzeit.edu