Meet Kamal Ahmad, Founder of the Asian University for Women
Friday, September 15th, 6:30pm to 8:30pm
Kamal Ahmad, who holds an AB from Harvard College, demonstrated at an early age a deep interest in education - from the grassroots level on an international basis. Throughout his law career and then at the World Bank, he continued to develop and found support for his passion.
The idea for the University for Women grew out of the World Bank/UN Task Force on Higher Education and Society. In 2000, the Task Force published its findings in a report entitled “Higher Education in Developing Countries: Peril and Promise” (more information available at http://www.tfhe.net/), which concluded that developing countries must improve the quality of their institutions of higher learning, in both governance and pedagogy, in order to compete in today’s increasingly globalized, knowledge-based economy.
Grants from the Government of Bangladesh (of 100 acres of land for the campus), as well as the Goldman Sachs Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2005 and 2006, provided the start-up funds that enabled AUW to become operational in 2008, with Kamal Ahmad as the founder. The University now has students from 15 countries and just had its fifth graduating class; quite a landmark achievement!
Kamal is in Singapore for a short few days but will be having an open discussion with the Harvard alumni and friends here at the University, his views of education, women, and the future.
Date: Friday, Sep 15, 2017
Time: 6:30pm to 8:30pm
Location: Near Sixth Avenue MRT
Space is limited, please sign up ASAP here.