I just held my first Modern Biology review session at 1 PM.  Exam #1 is tomorrow.  As far as I can tell, there is nothing different about these Qatari students compared to the Pittsburgh students.  They all want to know what exactly is going to be on the exam (exactly).  We had a good review session.  I would say about half of the students in the class showed up.  After the review session, I put the exam to “bed”, made photocopies and scooted home.  I made it back to the apartment around 4 PM.

The reason I was a little late was I stopped in the CMU-Q building and looked at some booths that had been set up for the INJAZ competition.  The INJAZ is the Arabic version of Junior Achievement and it is affiliated with the JA organization in the USA <http://www.injazalarab.org/>.  The Qatar competition was held at the CMU-Q building and the winners go on to the international meeting of INJAZ in Morocco in the Fall.  There were 6 booths and the competition was for each student group to conceive of a business idea, develop the plan, launch the company and then liquidate it in a time period of 6 weeks.  I took a few photos the the booths.  One of the reasons I stopped at the booths is that INJAZ occupies the office right next door to mine and I saw them scurrying like crazy getting ready for this competition all week long.

Quite an operation with a lot of people working on it.

 

The competition got started just as I started my review session.

The Envirostyle booth described a company that makes environmentally friendly potpourri.  Hmmmm, I thought it all was?!

The “Creative Hands of Qatar” was design fashion with tops and bracelets.

I didn’t exactly figure out what Exscentric was, but it was a “pop-pop” booth complete with music (Beyoncé’s Single Ladies [Put A Ring On It]) and foot prints on the floor to lead you to their booth.

See the blue foot prints !

The last one I looked at was a guided tour company called “Pour Toi” (For You) that had the most complex set up and, it seemed, most complete business plan and marketing strategy.  I guess there is a lot of competition for guided tours here in Qatar out of Doha.

Anyway...one of the perks of going to the booths is that they all gave out candy. 

So like the Pittsburgh campus of CMU, this campus hosts a variety of outreach activities and sponsors other meetings and events.  “Create. Inform. Connect.”  Junior Achievement seems like a natural since one of CMU-Q’s degree programs in in business.

Enough “Working on the Weekend”.  Time to go hit the pool for a cool dip, it’s only 93°F.