Student representatives from the different programmes and organizations invited student panelists from France, Malaysia, and UAE for a virtual round table discussion primarily to network, collaborate, and create meaningful conversations about their university student life amidst the COVID-19 global disruptions.

Dr. Hasan Almulla addressed the student panelists and attendees. In his words, “The COVID-19 has brought significant challenges and huge social and economic impact across all sectors, and that technology has to play. The transition to online mode of learning has allowed institutions to cross borders, making the world much smaller for everyone.” He added that even though this difficult time has disrupted almost everything, it has undoubtedly presented opportunities for a new thinking on the provision of higher education , specifically in teaching, learning and research. He expressed his excitement for students from different countries, and cultures coming together to discuss current issues in education and to reflect on their personal experiences as learners in challenging and innovative learning environment. 

The student panelists were Matthieu Brice and Maxime Beriot from France; Abdul Wahab Usman Ullah from Malaysia; Dana Alkurdi from Saudi Arabia; and Nawal Khan, Ayman Alshaikh, and Mohammad Umar from Bahrain. Other than the meet-and-greet agendum, they talked about their interests, realizations, and experiences in their academic journey relating to their programme of study, discussed coping mechanisms with the current mode of learning in the completion of their courses, shared career development plans after graduation from university, and extended inspiration to other students especially to incoming university students on which degree programmes to take up. There were relatively interesting questions from the attendees and were answered enthusiastically by the student panelists. 

Nawal Kaleem Khan moderated the discussion for having confluent experiences being an active student of Bachelor of Science in Mechatronics Engineering, and the topnotcher of Huawei’s Seeds for the Future Program 2020 in the Kingdom of Bahrain.