For all countries, the greatest challenge to successful progress and development is fostering quality education. Through education and knowledge, economies develop, we become more civilized, societies prosper and the highest civilizational ambitions are realized. Thanks to the wisdom and insight of its leadership, the United Arab Emirates has recognized the challenge and what is needed to overcome it and excel. It has established schools, launched programs and mobilized all of its human and physical resources. Further, the UAE has drawn inspiration from successful international models and reproduced aspects of them, as it shapes its own education system. This has seen the UAE, in less than half a century, rank high on regional and international development indicators.

The outstanding achievements made by the UAE in education, recorded in international reports and by specialized agencies, are not a matter of luck or coincidence. Rather, they are the result of decades of planning and serious efforts from public institutions invested in education.

This publication includes several papers delivered at the conference ‘Education and Development: Investing in the Future,’ which was organized by the Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research (ECSSR) in November 2016. The papers provide intellectuals, those interested in education and decision makers with rich and diverse material on the educational system and its goals in the UAE, which will help identify its mechanisms, characteristics and outlook for the future.