Shahid Motahari Educational Festival

Scientific educational-research festivals are regularly designed programmes in which one or more educational or research areas are discussed. Every festival is usually focused on a specific academic domain, and relevant activities in one specific time period (e.g. One year) are investigated. These festivals provide an appropriate situation for the scientific competition among educational and research institutions. Scientific festivals have long been held around the world, but educational and research festivals in Islamic republic of Iran have been organized in the recent decades to monitor activities carried out in the given domains. Razi Research Festival on Medical Sciences is one of the well-known scientific festivals on research in Islamic republic of Iran that is annually held by the Deputy of Research and Technology, Ministry of Health and Medical Education in the late fall and mainly monitors the research products by the faculty members, researchers, students, research centers and medical research journals (1). Khwarizmi International Award, with a longer history and a rather similar domain, is annually held by the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology (2). Avicenna festival is held by Tehran University of Medical Sciences in various academic and research domains, whose scope of activity is mostly, centered in Tehran University of Medical Sciences and in some domains around the others medical universities (3). Also, Tabari Research Festival has recently started its activity at Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences (4). Shahid Motahari Festival is the most important educational festival in Iran which is held annually in May by the Deputy Ministry for Education, Ministry of Health and Medical Education coinciding with the anniversary of the martyrdom of the teacher of ethics and Professor of Seminary School and University, “Morteza Motahari”. This festival analyzes the educational activities of the faculty members, students and educational authorities at medical universities and praises the excellent educational processes (5). This festival has started its activity in 2008 and has been held six times at different medical universities of Iran (Table 1). Table 1.Shahid Motahari festival records Round Year Host First 2008 Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences Second 2009 Shiraz University of Medical Sciences Third 2010 Iran University of Medical Sciences Fourth 2011 Mashad University of Medical Sciences Fifth 2012 Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences Sixth 2013 Ministry of Health and Medical Education Seventh 2014 Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences The seventh round of this festival is expected to be held in Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences in May, 2014. Given the educational approach of this festival and its coincidence with the 15th annual national congress of Iran’s Medical Education, it is specifically considered crucial in the educational approach of medical universities in Iran and is favorably supported by the Ministry of Health and Medical Education. In the new employment regulations for the faculty members, the main owners of every nationally selected process (final winners) will be provided with a promotion. Shahid Motahari Festival is currently held nationally and at university levels; however, it is expected to be held internationally soon in the future. In this festival various educational activities and processes are presented by the faculty members based on the standards and accreditation of educational processes. Having been analyzed, the excellent works will be selected for national competition. In the national stage, every process is investigated and scored based on the instructions in educational and cultural domains (5). The motto of the seventh festival of Shahid Motahari will be “qualitative development of education, the key to educational justice”. This festival is centered on eight topics: methods and techniques of education, educational planning, assessment in education, academic counseling and guidance, educational structure, ethics in education, educational rules and regulations and educational productions. In the upcoming round, it is expected to praise about 40 educational processes (6). It is hoped that the faculty members, students and medical universities present their best educational processes taking into account the principles of innovation and invention in presenting the most effective and up-to-date educational methods to provide the ground for more academic change in medical education.