Hoyas Put Georgetown Values Into Practice at WISE 2019 Summit and Doha Learning Days

Zahra Babar Associate Director of Research

The WISE 2019 Summit, held under the theme “UnLearn, ReLearn: What it Means to be Human,” at Qatar National Convention Centre on November 19-21, brought together thousands of educators, decision-makers, and influential experts from the public and private sectors from over 100 countries. They gathered in Doha for engaging plenaries, dialogues, debates, and tailored networking sessions to reimagine and build the future of education. In the lead up to the Summit, WISE launched Doha Learning Days on November 14-19, an experiential learning festival held in Education City’s Ceremonial Court and Green-Spine, comprising a range of activities organized in collaboration with over 57 local organizations and innovators.

At the summit, Georgetown University in Qatar faculty, staff, students, & alumni served as youth advocates, panelists, program developers and participants. Putting Georgetown values of social justice, education, and service to others into practice, they made a contribution to the effort to reimagine education, explore new educational tech, & promote lifelong learning. For Doha Learning Days, our students served as Community Development Advisers, Assistance Residence Coordinators, & more.

Discover more about the 2019 WISE Summit at  https://www.wise-qatar.org/

WISE2019 SUMMIT:

GU-Q STUDENT

Alghalya Al-Qubaisi

International Politics (GU-Q’20)

Alghalya, a Teach For Qatar campus ambassador, was selected as a member of the 2019-2020 WISE Learner’s Voice cohort, and #WISE19 Summit participant.

GU-Q ALUMNI:

Deena Newaz

Culture and Politics (SFS’16)

Program Officer, WISE

Speaker: HEAR MY STORY – Education journeys of WISE Emerging Leaders

Deena, a GU-Q alum and a current MPhil student at the University of Cambridge, has been a program manager for WISE Learners’ Voice and Emerging Leaders program since 2016. She returned to Doha to moderate a session at the WISE Summit and to lead the delivery of the WISE Emerging Leaders program, which includes workshops on personal and professional development for education practitioners aged 24-32 in areas such as collaborative change, systems change, and wellbeing.

Thana Hassan El-Sallabi

International History (SFS’17, MA‘18)

Program Officer, WISE

Thana manages the Awards program at WISE and is also one of the managers of the Launchpad in the Majlis for the summit this year. She moderated two Launchpad sessions.

The Launchpad provided a supportive collegial environment where speakers inform and engage participants to consider unusual perspectives and new thinking. Presentations used a storytelling approach grounded in research, experience and best practices.

Haroon Yasin (SFS’15)

WISE Awards Ceremony

Each year, the WISE Awards recognize and promote six successful innovative projects that are addressing global educational challenges.

Haroon Yasin, who co-founded Orenda, the innovative digital learning program for underprivileged children while a GU-Q senior, took part in the WISE  Awards Plenary session.

Panel: “Scaling up impact from grassroots to systemic change.”

Haroon took part on this panel with three other experts who hold broad grassroots experience to explore the impact of and effective strategies for producing learning gains at scale, and to discuss the challenges that are raised as a result. While innovative solutions have successfully tackled problems within specific ecosystems, the panelists discussed why these efforts do not reliably lead to broader systemic transformation.

Anne Nebel

Associate Dean for Teaching, Learning and Assessment

Anne Nebel was invited to share her insights and expertise at the #WISE19 Edtech Testbed Roundtable, a gathering of leaders from across the education field, including researchers, edtech startup founders and edtech testbed leaders. This roundtable explored the effective introduction of technology into schools and other learning environments through the creation of edtech testbeds.

Zahra Babar

Associate Director of Research, CIRS

Zahra Babar was invited to participate as a panelist in the WISE session titled “Arab States-Migration, displacement and education: Building bridges, not walls.” She shared her expertise on how migrations and displacement affect education access, quality, and inclusiveness in the Arab world.

Jeremy Koons

Associate Professor of Philosophy

Dr. Koons served as a spokesperson at Qatar Foundation’s Meetup Booth for a short presentation on the purpose and impact of education, followed by a Q&A.

Gerd Nonneman

Professor of International Relations & Gulf Studies

Dr. Nonneman served as a spokesperson at Qatar Foundation’s Meetup Booth for a presentation on “Learning what matters in an era of information abundance,” where he discussed the difference between passive and active knowledge consumption, acquisition of knowledge, and information source reliability.

STUDENT DELEGATES:

Education Above All Youth Advocates:

Hamideh Dorzadeh

Anood Al Kuwari

Hana Elshehaby

Mustafe Deeq Axmed

Noof Al-Jefairi

Noor Rajab Al-Esmail

Ngoc Nuguyen

Ousman Camara

Asna Siddiqui

DOHA LEARNING DAYS

Students who served as Community Development Advisors to deliver workshops about Housing and Residence Life Values:

Mustafe Axmed

Salma Hassan 

Iman Ismail 

Ayesha Iqbal 

Aiman Khan 

Saba Bikashvili 

Shinyoung Kim 

Haider Ahmar 

Asna Siddiqui

Students who served as Assistance Residence Coordinators in the planning and set-up of the booth:

Khansa Maria

Suleikha Hashi

Student interns at WISE who contributed to logistics and coordination efforts.

Sarah Abdussalam

Roudah Al-Naema