Executive Director, Student Services at Qatar Foundation, Dr Abdulnassir Al Tamimi (left) and Director of Academic Affairs at QF Higher Education, Dr. Samah Gamar
Doha, Qatar: Qatar Foundation will celebrate the academic achievements of its largest-ever and “resilient” class this year, with eight universities conferring degrees on their graduating students today.
The Class of 2024 will add their names to more than 7,000 QF alumni who continue to make an impact in the society.
“This is the largest graduating class in the history of Qatar Foundation with about 1,000 students from more than 75 nationalities across the eight universities. We are also proud to announce that 40% of the graduating class are Qataris out of which about 72% of them are female and 28% male,” said Executive Director, Student Services at Qatar Foundation Dr Abdulnassir Al Tamimi speaking to The Peninsula yesterday.
“This is one of the most resilient class. They started their academic journey during the pandemic and they’re ending their journey with the crisis that we are witnessing in the world today,” he added.
He also said that the Class of 2024 has been very active advocating for equality, justice and human rights.
Dr Al Tamimi explained that the Class of 2024 has gained different experiences over their four years of education, including serving as volunteers at the World Cup, Expo 2023 Doha and the Asian Cup that was recently held in Qatar.
“I think this is the most motivated, resilient, and most globally aware group of students. This class is going to be very successful in their personal and professional lives because hard times breed strong people,” he said.
Dr Al Tamimi also highlighted that his office is in-charge of Student Services that aim at providing services and support to all students enrolled at the 8 universities and also enrich the experience of each student by providing them with opportunities to gain transferable skills such as leadership, communication, teamwork and collaboration to name a few.
“What we do is we try to bring students from all the universities together and we organize, different student engagement activities, workshops, conferences that would promote these important transferable skills,” said Dr. Al Tamimi.
For example, the recently established multiversity student clubs bring students from all universities who then collaborate and organize programmes that promote student development. We recently launched a number of new multiversity student clubs such QF Al-Noor Muslim Student Association, Wesal Entrepreneurship Club, International Student Organisation, Qatari Students Organisation, and the Arabic Student Club. These student clubs have played a major role in promoting student engagement, wellbeing and important skills that will help them personally and professionally.
Director of Academic Affairs at QF Higher Education, Dr. Samah Gamar speaking to the media said QF higher education aims to create a lot more cohesion and opportunities for students across Education City universities.
“Our hope is that students don’t just feel that they are part of one campus, but that they are also part of other campuses at the same time – as a whole unit within an education setting,” she said.
Dr. Gamar also highlighted that QF is equally focusing on its increasing number of alumni and ways absorb them into Qatar’s job market and prevent brain drain.
“We want to ensure that we don’t lose connection with the alumni. Qatar Foundation is interested in keeping as many students within Qatar Foundation and Qatar, to work in the labor market and industry here. And so we are more directed to making sure that they have opportunities for work and for continued educational opportunities within Qatar. So that we don’t have a brain drain,” she said.
