Dr. Ahmad bin Mohammed Al-Zaidi has been made director of the General Department of Education in Makkah region by the Minister of Education Dr. Hamad bin Mohammed Al-Sheikh. Previously, Al-Zaidi was the deputy director of the Center for the Development of University Education in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Al-Zaidi holds a bachelor’s degree in biology from the College of Education at Umm Al-Qura University. He also received his master’s degree from the same university in educational management. He earned his doctorate in educational leadership and management from the College of Education at the University of Newcastle in the UK. Al-Zaidi began his career as a teacher in 1986, working in several schools until 1994. After that, he became a supervisor of biology at the Educational Supervision Center in Jeddah. He then became the assistant director at the center between 1997 and 2000. Al-Zaidi had been an assistant professor of educational administration at King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah since 2011, before becoming the head of the department in 2012. On Wednesday, the General Department of Education in Makkah region will launch “Future Gate,” a digital transformation initiative. The initiative aims to promote digital learning and change the traditional setting in schools, encouraging more technology-enabled teaching and learning. The first phase will be in the first semester of the coming academic year, featuring 80 schools, before expanding to a further 175 in the second phase.