Published research, a successful nonprofit, and a journalism award: Inside GU-Q’s MENA Class of 2026
Before they had even graduated, this class had already begun to make its mark. A Jordanian-Canadian economist published in multiple top-tier peer-reviewed journals while still an undergraduate, earning one of Qatar’s most competitive academic honors. A Moroccan student secured more than $250,000 in climate justice funding and brought her advocacy to the United Nations. A Palestinian-Jordanian journalist became the first student from her campus to receive a university-wide award for journalism.
These are just a few of the stories from the 22 graduating seniors hailing from across the Middle East and North Africa. For these students, Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q) offered something rare: a world-class American education anchored in the region they call home, with access to mentors, diplomats, and opportunities that turned ambition into action.
Sadiq Melhim | Jordan/Canada | International Economics
Sadiq Melhim arrived at GU-Q as an economics student and an athlete. He graduated magna cum laude as something rarer: an undergraduate with an impactful peer-reviewed publication record that most graduate students would envy.
Mentored by economics professors Dr. Lamis Kattan and Dr. Alexis Antoniades, along with other distinguished faculty at GU-Q, Sadiq developed a strong foundation in economic theory and applied research. He subsequently conducted research across Qatar’s research institutions, studying sustainable aviation fuels at Qatar Environment and Energy Research Institute, advanced battery technologies at Qatar University, and translating those findings into policy briefs at leading Qatari institutions. His work earned him the Qatar Foundation Excellence Award and resulted in multiple publications in Q1 journals including Economies, Sustainability, and Energies. Six internships across Qatar’s research and policy landscape rounded out an exceptional undergraduate portfolio.
Education City’s multiversity model proved transformative, connecting him with mentors across institutions who taught him “the importance of initiative, identifying gaps and taking ownership of solutions.” Outside the lab, he mentored youth at the Qatar Orphan Care Center and represented both GU-Q and Qatar Sports Club on the football pitch.
Now headed to a fully funded Master’s in Economics at University of Waterloo in Canada, Sadiq leaves behind an important example to follow: “The value of the experience lies not only in the classroom, but in the initiative you take — seeking research, building relationships, and exploring interdisciplinary work.”
Rania Harrara | Morocco | International Politics
Speaking at UN Event
African Student Association Event
Speaking at COP28
Rania Harrara does not wait to be invited to the table. The Moroccan International Politics graduate spent four years at GU-Q building platforms for marginalized voices — and then handing those platforms to the world.
As a transfer student, she founded GU-Q’s Jessup Moot Court team from scratch, leading her peers to national and then international competition. She initiated the university’s first student delegation to COP28 before she had even set foot on campus, and her honors thesis on settler-colonial violence reflected the same unflinching commitment to justice that runs through everything she does.
Beyond Georgetown, Rania founded Climate Sirens SWANA, securing over $250,000 in grant funding to deliver trauma-informed climate justice programming across Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Jordan, and Egypt. She also won a Davis Projects for Peace grant to provide psychosocial support to displaced Gaza youth, and has represented marginalized communities at the UN General Assembly, COP28, COP29, and the Commission on the Status of Women.
“Service is not an activity but a responsibility — to show up, to listen, and to contribute to making people’s lives materially better in whatever capacity I can,” she says. Now bound for Cambridge University on a full Mastercard Foundation Scholarship, her quest for justice is just getting started.
Remas Alhawari | Jordan/Palestine | International Politics, French & Francophone Studies Minor, Media & Politics Certificate
Hosting Georgetown Pre-College Summer
In S. Korea with Patrick Laude’s Theology course
GU-Q Speaks event with Salman Ahad Khan (GU-Q’16) NYT podcast producer.
Remas Alhawari is graduating with a clear goal: rewrite the history of the region.
It’s a competency she has built over time. Born in Doha to a Jordanian household, Remas spent four years developing a lens that interrogates power and politics rather than simply studying it. Her honors thesis recovered oral histories from Jordanians who lived through the 1990-1991 Gulf War, a forgotten history abandoned by the state. An internship at Al Jazeera English‘s The Take quickly turned into a full production role, when they discovered the sharp instincts she had already honed by co-founding GU-Q Speaks, the university’s first student-run podcast. When her work reached the Washington, DC campus audiences, it earned her Georgetown’s Edward B. Bunn Award for Journalistic Excellence, the first Qatar student to ever achieve the distinction. At home, she was chosen to tell the final story of the Class of 2026 as senior class speaker, where she wove a gripping tale of four years spent braving wars, regime changes, and disruptive technologies.
Now accepted into the prestigious Erasmus Mundus Master’s Programme in Journalism, Media and Globalisation, her direction is clear: “Journalism that holds power accountable, amplifies underrepresented voices, and refuses to flatten the complexity of this region into digestible narratives for outside consumption. Georgetown gave me the tools. Now it is time to use them.”
Georgetown University in Qatar’s Class of 2026 leaves behind not just academic records, but proof for every prospective student across the MENA region that the path from this campus leads anywhere ambition is willing to go.
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