Dr. Edward Stuenkel
Doha: The College of Health and Life Sciences (CHLS) at Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU) continues to grow in faculty, course offerings, research project opportunities to produce professionals to address national and global health challenges, said the Founding Dean of the College.
The College provides an engaging and highly positive scientific training environment for students to excel and, upon graduation, launch a successful career, said Founding Dean of CHIL Dr. Edward Stuenkel.
“CHLS maintains considerable enthusiasm for recruiting a group of excellent student candidates for the 2021-2022 academic year,” he told The Peninsula.
CHLS provides essential educational and research training to future leaders in the fields of biomedical sciences, genomics, precision medicine, and exercise science. Due to COVID-19 programs at CHLS are delivered in an innovative blended method.
“This delivery merges specific advantages of an interactive online format with more experiential and laboratory-based face-to-face training. The educational focus of the college remains to engage student learning, develop skills in critical thinking and creativity, and to facilitate scientific discovery,” said Dr. Stuenkel.
The College embodies a multidisciplinary learning approach to research and discovery and aims to become a dedicated hub of knowledge sharing in the area of health and life sciences. Its programs integrate scientific expertise by combining a seasoned collective of research partners within the university with esteemed external clinical and health science partners.
“The college has a wide diversity of research initiatives and projects which its students may become involved in. The college’s primary faculty span the areas of precision medicine as well as molecular and cellular understanding of physiological function and dysfunction,” said Dr. Stuenkel.
“In addition, the college is in partnership and has joint and adjunct faculty with a number of biomedical scientists at other institutions and clinical centers including Sidra Medicine, Weill Cornell Medical Center, Hamad Medical Corporation and others. This provides not only terrific research opportunities for our students but also an extensive professional community of which they are an integral part,” he said.
CHLS was founded in 2018, has 134 students following five programmes at present. They represent more than 60 nationalities and among them 12 percent are Qatari students. The College has 49 alumni.
Speaking about the career perspectives for CHLS graduates, Dr. Stuenkel said, “Graduates of the college have career prospects within the rapidly growing biomedical and health sector in Qatar, as well as globally.”
“The recent emphasis to advance and improve healthcare through the application of precision medicine creates a strong need for such a highly trained and communicative workforce. In addition, combining precision medicine, physical activity, and nutrition for preventative health care creates exciting new opportunities for those receiving multidisciplinary training in exercise science.
Addressing health challenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic has re-focused public attention on the critical importance of trained biomedical scientists to a progressive society. This stimulates growth in clinical, industrial and academic research enterprises that will provide sensational employment opportunities,” he added.
