Following on from the 2014 conference of Arab Research Centers (held December 6-8 in Doha, Qatar), and demand from its audience, the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies has decided to devote the annual gathering of policy institutes to the study of the Gulf Cooperation Council states. Beginning in December of 2015, the Conference of Arab Research Centers will be titled the Gulf Studies Forum, a regular event given over to the study of the GCC and the Arabian Peninsula. The meeting, organized by the ACRPS’ Policy Analysis Unit, will be held yearly during the first week of December. By maintaining the same rigorous standards upheld by all of the ACRPS’ academic conferences, it will address a long-standing need for insightful, regionally based scholarship on the Western shore of the Gulf.  The first edition of the Gulf Studies Forum will be dedicated to the theme of education in the GCC states. Regional and broader global themes will continue to inform the proceedings of the Forum.