The program commenced its activities by holding a workshop (Cairo: 27-28 April,2005) with the participation of twenty rectors of major universities in AWO Member States or their representatives, as well as eminent representatives from relevant institutions, such as the Federation of Arab Universities, and the Institute of Arab Research and Studies of the Arab Organization for Education, Culture and Science and the American University in Cairo.

Participants in the workshop unanimously agreed that the pursuit to modify university rules and procedures with the aim of bringing about the desired change was impractical due to its difficulty. They suggested instead generating this change through indirect methods by endeavoring to make the academic climate in Arab universities more receptive to the concept of gender. To achieve this goal, the workshop suggested using several mechanisms, including: research grants, awards, training courses as well as publishing gender sensitive academic books. AWO had effectuated all of these mechanisms within this program.