NEWS
Dr. Al-Ansari: Opening Cognitive and Professional Horizons for University Members and Graduates UoB Launches an Electronic Professional Development Project in Cooperation with A Global Training Platform
Sakhir – University of Bahrain
18 September 2023
The University of Bahrain (UoB) launched an electronic professional development project, in partnership with Coursera, the global platform for massive open online courses.
The project targets about a thousand trainees of university students, faculty members, administrative staff, academics appointed to administrative positions, and the University’s unemployed graduates.
On this occasion, Dr. Fuad Mohammed Al-Ansari, President of UoB, noted the importance of the project, saying: “The electronic professional development project contributes to developing knowledge and expertise of faculty members and students, and helps raise the capabilities of National University graduates, in line with the abor market needs and the job skills that will be required in the future.”, explaining that the global platform provides more than eight thousand open courses in the most prestigious international universities and institutes, which opens cognitive and professional horizons for those affiliated with the University.
Dr. Al-Ansari called for viewing the educational courses and curricula that the trainee can choose from and obtain a professional certificate – through the platform – that is accredited by Coursera, the institution providing the chosen course, and UoB, stressing that the University will continue to investigate opportunities that help its members develop their potential and abilities in various fields.
Regarding the University’s efforts to launch this project, Dr. Sheikha Fai Bint Abdullah Al Khalifa, Director of the E-Learning Center, stated: “establishing the electronic professional development project took about two years of planning and work, and it is one of the most important major strategic projects for the E-Learning Center at the University.”.
She further stated: “The project provides beneficiaries with the opportunity to obtain a license to complete any training course of their choice via the platform remotely, as it provides a large number of open courses from the most prestigious international universities and institutes such as (London Imperial College, Yale University, John Hopkins University, and INSEAD), and a number of major companies such as (IBM, Microsoft, GOOGLE, AWS, and META).”.
Moreover, Dr. Sheikha Fai bint Abdullah noted that “The project focuses on the fast-growing specializations that are wanted in the current labor market, and covers the skills required in future jobs.”.
The E-Learning Center called on those wishing to benefit from the training courses to quickly review the conditions and register via the electronic link sent to the University affiliates and graduates via e-mail, noting that all courses are offered in many languages, including the Arabic and English languages.
During the first pilot year of the project, about 200 graduates are expected to benefit from free training courses, enabling them to enrich their resumes and develop their skills to enter the labor market. The project will provide special training courses for academic employees appointed to administrative positions at the University, specially designed to develop their management skills in leadership positions such as: risk management, business continuity, financial planning, resource allocation, compliance management, and auditing.
In addition, the project provides a large number of guided projects using remote virtual laboratories, through which the student can use programs hosted on other devices remotely, so that the practical training students learn the modern digital tools used in the future jobs, which is what will be tested in several courses at the University this year.
It is worth noting that the leading educational platform Coursera was founded in 2012 by two professors from Stanford University, with the aim of providing learning experiences to anyone, anywhere, and currently benefitting more than 100 million registered learners from all over the world.
