CG honors selected Saudis JEDDAH – The five participants going to US President Barack Obama's Summit on Entrepreneurship (April 26-27) in Washington from Jeddah were honored at a reception Tuesday evening at the residence of Martin R. Quinn, US Consul General. Consisting of four young students all hailing from Dar Al-Hekma College in Jeddah – Lamees Al-Mufti, Muna Alamer, Nora Al-Maghrabi and Maria Al-Mahdaly – and renowned businessman Waleed Al-Banawi, Vice Chairman of the Board at Banawi Industrial Group, the group has one thing in common: A talent for entrepreneurship. It was this common factor that was celebrated in the intimate gathering of businessmen and consulate personnel, where the four young women seemed to mingle with enviable ease and confidence with established businessmen, enthusiastically outlining the projects that won them a place at the summit. The emphasis during the entire evening was overwhelmingly on the large number of participants Jeddah has contributed – five out of nine from all over the country – to this prestigious event and the fact that four of them hail from the same college. Also present at the event were the dean of DAH, Dr. Suhair Al-Qurashi and Chairman of the Board of Trustees at the college, renowned businessman Zuhair Fayez who remarked at one point: “If Waleed (Al-Banawi) was of a different gender, he would be from Dar Al-Hekma too!” The summit will convene at the Ronald Reagan Building & International Trade Center in Washington DC, and will host a diverse range of participants from over 50 countries. According to an official statement from the US Departments of State and Commerce, the event's co-host, “the summit will highlight the role entrepreneurship can play in addressing common challenges while building partnerships that will lead to greater opportunity abroad and at home.” The five participants from Jeddah have certainly started doing just that at home and are certain to make their mark abroad as well. Lamees Al-Mufti is an Information Management Systems student at DAH and the CEO of Be the Change, a small, home-based business that uses motivational quotes on T-shirts and notebooks to inspire young people. “The name is inspired by Mahatma Gandhi's quote: ‘Be the change that you want to see in the world,'” she stated. Nora Al-Maghrabi and Muna Alamer – are both involved in the same project – a recycling club they started at the college called Naqa'ah (Purity). Al-Maghrabi is a nursing student who recognized a need for recycling in the community and founded the club. She has also won the Dar Al-Hekma Student Award for Social Responsibility and has more than 1,400 community service hours – in the span of 18 months – to her name. Named “a leader” by Consul General Quinn, Alamer is also set to make her mark on the world since she also heads the Model United Nations Club at DAH and has managed to create a globetrotting profile along with her academic life. Maria Al-Mahdaly, graphic design student, has managed to be named one of the top 30 student entrepreneurs in the world by the US-based Entrepreneurs' Organization and heads Fainak, an organization that seeks to develop a socially responsible youth culture via an interactive website and magazine. The only established entrepreneur from Jeddah, Waleed Al-Banawi, is heading an initiative on work culture at the Banawi Industrial Group along the lines of “adding value to everything we do, everyday,” a phrase hailed by Consul General Quinn as the “essence of entrepreneurship.” Al-Banawi asserted that “most businesses in the Kingdom started on the basis of entrepreneurship, with talented individuals using their entrepreneurial skills and hard work to build some of the biggest organizations in the Kingdom today.” He joked that he was far older than the four young women though and would be acting as a chaperone to them in Washington. Indeed, it is an extraordinary point in time for the four young women, who have already attended numerous global conferences, and are deservedly basking in the praise their initiatives are bringing them.
