Nineteen undergraduate and graduate students from across Education City have returned from a challenging outdoor adventure trip organised by Hamad Bin Khalifa University’s Student Life team in partnership with Outward Bound Oman.
The trip was part of EBDA, a leadership development programme that takes students out of the classroom to teach them life skills such as time management, working in teams, and staying calm under pressure.
Two separate groups of students - one male group and one female group - trekked across the Jebel Samhan mountain range in southern Oman and took part in a variety of physically and mentally challenging activities to test endurance, teach resilience, and unlock personal potential from December 12 to 16.
Participant Sana Mahdi al-Ansari, from Northwestern University in Qatar, commented: “The programme pushed me to my limit. I feel like a changed person. A lot of people didn’t even expect me to apply, let alone complete it. I proved to myself that I can do anything I put my mind to.”
As a part the EBDA leadership programme, students get the chance to meet and work with individuals from across Education City’s universities who come from a variety of backgrounds and study a wide range of academic specialties, while learning about their own strengths and weaknesses. Team building is a core goal of EBDA’s programme which aspires to be the pre-eminent student leadership programme in the Gulf region, focused on building leadership capacity in Qatar to help the country achieve its future ambitions.
Ameena Hussain, director of Student Life at Hamad Bin Khalifa University, said, “HBKU Student Life is incredibly proud of the 19 students who completed this leadership building programme in Oman. They demonstrated impressive determination, perseverance, and an ability to work in teams towards common goals. This programme was the last EBDA leadership programme of the fall semester and we look forward to hosting more leadership trainings for the students of HBKU and Education City in the spring semester.”