WATCH: President Hultin visits future site of NYU Abu Dhabi, sends video postcard from Dubai

President Jerry M. Hultin and members of the administration and faculty traveled to Abu Dhabi on January 11-16 to see the birthplace of Polytechnic Institute of NYU’s new home in New York University’s Global Network University.

In the above video, President Hultin gives an overview of the visit, which included the New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD) Engineering and Science Coordinating Groups, Provost Erich Kunhardt, and Chief of Staff, Ji Mi Choi.  Some members of the group joined President Hultin on visits to India and Dubai before landing in Abu Dhabi.

New York University’s Abu Dhabi campus will be the first comprehensive liberal arts and science campus in the Middle East to be operated abroad by a major American research university. Polytechnic will help to develop and run the school’s engineering activities.

There were multiple objectives for the Abu Dhabi visit:

• gain an overview of the area and its culture;
• learn more about approaches to science, mathematics, engineering and technology (STEM) education in the United Arab Emirates, with a particular emphasis on forging collaborations;
• expand discussions between the science and engineering groups at NYU and NYU-Poly;
• begin discussions with corporations to better understand the engineering needs and potential for internships in the area.

The members of the Engineering Coordinating Group from NYU-Poly are Iraj Kalkhoran, Sunil Kumar, Nasir Memon, Bharat Rao (see his impressive photos of Abu Dhabi and its Sheikh Zayed Mosque on Flickr), and Richard Thorsen. The members from NYU are Stephen Childress (Professor, Courant Institute) and Michael Ward (Director of the Molecular Design Institute and Chair, Department of Chemistry).

President Hultin sent this video postcard from his stop in Dubai: