On 23rd of March 2011, Dubai Women's College dedicated a day to celebrate International Women's Day. The celebration consisted of gathering powerful female leaders from around the world who can motivate young women and talk about women empowerment. The ceremony included guest speakers, panel discussion, and followed by various workshops.
Women's International Day started with a keynote speaker who is H.E Najla Al Awadhi Former member of parliament of the UAE, member of the world economic forum's you global leaders, and member of global agenda councils of the world economic forum. Najla Al Awadhi began the celebration of Women's International Day at DWC with a very inspiring speech that motivated young Emirati women yet informed them about the challenges of the real world. She emphasized on the Arab region and mostly the UAE. Najla's aim from this speech was to carefully notify females of the obstacles in a women's career life. In addition, she wanted to praise the accomplishments of the female gender in the UAE and provided statistics which show the ability of Emirati women. Najla stated that most of the female university graduates in the Arab region are Emiratis. Moreover, I was shocked to know that that majority of young
"Education is a life long journey" - Najla Al Awadhi
The second part International Women's Day celebration was showing a video (1911-2011) about the great achievements of women and how much the abilities of women has changed in the past 100 years. The video showed how much a women can now days be more than equal to the opposite gender. The movie also showed examples of powerful women who succeeded in their careers and also began a family and raised their own children. Shocking statistics were displayed such as, in 1840's women were denied to have access into Harvard's medical school, and now the female graduates are more than males. Furthermore, 1 in 3 businesses in USA are owned by women. There are 20 powerful female leaders in the world. Moreoever, there are 14 females who are self made billionaires.
The following part of the ceremony was a panel discussion between Nima Abu-Wardeh who is the presenter of the BBC World News weekly financial program, Middle East Business Report, Founder & CEO of cashy.me, Deanna Othman who is the Country General Manager, Premium Banking, UAE, Chair, UAE Diversity & INclusion Council - Standard Chartered Bank, Ginnie Carlier Partner and Diversity, Inclusiveness Leader, Ernst & Young MENA, Latifa Fikri who is Vice President-Product Marketing-E-vision, Etisalat President of DWC Alumnae Association, Nicholle Kingsley who is Senior Associate - Herbet Smith, and Manal Omar who is United States - Institute of Peace.
Dr.Behjat Al Yousuf who is assosiate director of DWC was the moderator of the panel discussion and asked each speaker to talk about her challenges as a women and achievements throughout her life. Nima Abu-Wardeh started the discussion by talking about how are women equal to men and how the impact of unemployment women affect the world. She stated that 3 out of 4 women in Egypt are unemployed. Deanna continued to talk about her challenges as a young ambitious woman who wanted to accomplish everything in an early age. Even though Deanna was born and raised in the USA she had a strict traditional family and she was the second to graduate college in her family. Ginnie implied that her challenge was that after all her had work in an organization she was finally going to be promoted as a manager but one of the men disagreed. However, Ginnie decided to look deep into his opinion to benefit from the his negative feedback. After Ginnie knew her weaknesses to tried to advance them and gave a chance to improve herself. One of the most interesting speakers to me was Latifa Fikri because she was the only Emirati and she made me proud. Latifa encouraged women to prove themselves in an organization because they will be forgotten. In addition, she adviced women to not be afraid to be misunderstood. Nicholle was of the motivational speakers who told the audience to be confident and believe in themselves. She adviced women to have goals. The las speaker was Manal who wrote a book that's called "Barefoot in Baghdad". Manal inspired us to volunteer and help human beings.
After a great panel discussion, many workshops were available for the audience to attend. I decided to attend the "Emiratweet Social Media and Network" workshop. This workshop was actually the crowdest among all workshops and people were hoping to have seats. The workshop was held by three Emirati women who were the founders of Emiratweet. They talked about the purpose of their creation which was to discuss topics that matter every Emirati person. They wanted to have people communicating online and create and authentic source to UAE'S life and history. The three Emirati girls decided to make a change in te society and to help young Emiratis in their projects and life and introduce them to people. Emiratweet actually held events like Emirateyat, We Belong, and Think the Unthinkable. The Emirateyat project was to highlight Emirati achievements and the We Belong project was to help disable people and show them that there is hope. In addition, Think the Unthinkable was their first event to hold and it discussed financial crisis. Each one of these events was attended and supported by popular Emiratis like Sultan Al Qassemi, Nayla Al Khaja, and Ali Mostafa. The workshop also was about the importance of social media in the world and in the UAE. Emiratweet founders stated that in 2010 10 million arabs were on social media platforms and 30% of these were Emiratis. Emiratweet have accounts in many social media platforms like Tumblr, Facebook, Flickr, their own website, and even a YouTube channel.
Women's International Day started with a keynote speaker who is H.E Najla Al Awadhi Former member of parliament of the UAE, member of the world economic forum's you global leaders, and member of global agenda councils of the world economic forum. Najla Al Awadhi began the celebration of Women's International Day at DWC with a very inspiring speech that motivated young Emirati women yet informed them about the challenges of the real world. She emphasized on the Arab region and mostly the UAE. Najla's aim from this speech was to carefully notify females of the obstacles in a women's career life. In addition, she wanted to praise the accomplishments of the female gender in the UAE and provided statistics which show the ability of Emirati women. Najla stated that most of the female university graduates in the Arab region are Emiratis. Moreover, I was shocked to know that that majority of young
entrepreneurs in the UAE are women. Nevertheless, she gave shocking statistics to prove that the Arab world needs more female leaders. Like, the lack of female employment costs a country billions, and if enough women were employed a country's GDP can increase up to 2-4%. In addition, she indicated that half of South Asia women are illiterate. A very surprising fact about UAE is that 30-40% of female Emiratis report sexual, verbal, or physical abuse in the workplace. Najla said that gender and humanity are the biggest obstacles in the Arab region. She ended her speech by recommending five tools for the young females around the world to work by and to help improve the society. The first tool was that to begin the learning of women's and men's role at home and educate family first. Second tool was education which is to have hunger for learning more because education is a life long journey. Thirdly, to read the constitutional rights in the UAE to know as a citizen that there is no differentiation of men and women in the country. Fourthly, is to know about your country and region and have background. Lastly, is to use social media to talk about women empowerment.
"Education is a life long journey" - Najla Al Awadhi
The second part International Women's Day celebration was showing a video (1911-2011) about the great achievements of women and how much the abilities of women has changed in the past 100 years. The video showed how much a women can now days be more than equal to the opposite gender. The movie also showed examples of powerful women who succeeded in their careers and also began a family and raised their own children. Shocking statistics were displayed such as, in 1840's women were denied to have access into Harvard's medical school, and now the female graduates are more than males. Furthermore, 1 in 3 businesses in USA are owned by women. There are 20 powerful female leaders in the world. Moreoever, there are 14 females who are self made billionaires.
The following part of the ceremony was a panel discussion between Nima Abu-Wardeh who is the presenter of the BBC World News weekly financial program, Middle East Business Report, Founder & CEO of cashy.me, Deanna Othman who is the Country General Manager, Premium Banking, UAE, Chair, UAE Diversity & INclusion Council - Standard Chartered Bank, Ginnie Carlier Partner and Diversity, Inclusiveness Leader, Ernst & Young MENA, Latifa Fikri who is Vice President-Product Marketing-E-vision, Etisalat President of DWC Alumnae Association, Nicholle Kingsley who is Senior Associate - Herbet Smith, and Manal Omar who is United States - Institute of Peace.
Dr.Behjat Al Yousuf who is assosiate director of DWC was the moderator of the panel discussion and asked each speaker to talk about her challenges as a women and achievements throughout her life. Nima Abu-Wardeh started the discussion by talking about how are women equal to men and how the impact of unemployment women affect the world. She stated that 3 out of 4 women in Egypt are unemployed. Deanna continued to talk about her challenges as a young ambitious woman who wanted to accomplish everything in an early age. Even though Deanna was born and raised in the USA she had a strict traditional family and she was the second to graduate college in her family. Ginnie implied that her challenge was that after all her had work in an organization she was finally going to be promoted as a manager but one of the men disagreed. However, Ginnie decided to look deep into his opinion to benefit from the his negative feedback. After Ginnie knew her weaknesses to tried to advance them and gave a chance to improve herself. One of the most interesting speakers to me was Latifa Fikri because she was the only Emirati and she made me proud. Latifa encouraged women to prove themselves in an organization because they will be forgotten. In addition, she adviced women to not be afraid to be misunderstood. Nicholle was of the motivational speakers who told the audience to be confident and believe in themselves. She adviced women to have goals. The las speaker was Manal who wrote a book that's called "Barefoot in Baghdad". Manal inspired us to volunteer and help human beings.
After a great panel discussion, many workshops were available for the audience to attend. I decided to attend the "Emiratweet Social Media and Network" workshop. This workshop was actually the crowdest among all workshops and people were hoping to have seats. The workshop was held by three Emirati women who were the founders of Emiratweet. They talked about the purpose of their creation which was to discuss topics that matter every Emirati person. They wanted to have people communicating online and create and authentic source to UAE'S life and history. The three Emirati girls decided to make a change in te society and to help young Emiratis in their projects and life and introduce them to people. Emiratweet actually held events like Emirateyat, We Belong, and Think the Unthinkable. The Emirateyat project was to highlight Emirati achievements and the We Belong project was to help disable people and show them that there is hope. In addition, Think the Unthinkable was their first event to hold and it discussed financial crisis. Each one of these events was attended and supported by popular Emiratis like Sultan Al Qassemi, Nayla Al Khaja, and Ali Mostafa. The workshop also was about the importance of social media in the world and in the UAE. Emiratweet founders stated that in 2010 10 million arabs were on social media platforms and 30% of these were Emiratis. Emiratweet have accounts in many social media platforms like Tumblr, Facebook, Flickr, their own website, and even a YouTube channel.
