Status Audio Magazine

Ramzi Salemeh is the former Senior Specialist on Higher Education at UNESCO Beirut. Dr. Salemeh received his doctorate in psychology from the University of Montreal. Prior to working as the Acting Director and Senior Specialist on Higher Education at UNESCO Beirut, Dr. Salemeh was a full acting professor at Laval University in Montreal, Canada. He also worked at Montreal University as a lecturer and has been consulted on school psychology by numerous institutions of higher education across Canada. Between 2009 and 2013, he was the delegate of the President of Saint Joseph University for quality assurance in higher education.

Besides working across Canada, Dr. Salemeh has also been very active in the cultural and education sectors in Lebanon. Since 2016, he has been the Secretary of the National Council for Traffic Safety through the government. Dr. Salemeh has also served as the Executive Director of the Bureau of Studies, Foresight and Competency Development (MADARC). He was also the Principal Consultant for the Ministry of Culture from 2000 to 2003. Dr. Salemeh is known for his work on traffic safety, quality monitoring in higher education, university working conditions, youth policy, cultural education, and refugee education. An active member of the Lebanese Commission for Educational Sciences since 2008, he is recognized as a leader in his field with over four decades of experience.

Dr. El Khawaga’s areas of research include the dynamics of knowledge production in the Arab region, and higher education policies more broadly. Dina’s academic work is focusing on new social movements, law and society and sociology of activism. She has acted as advisor to governmental and non-governmental institutions on civil society, the media industry, right to information, and higher education. Before joining AUB, she served as the programs director at the Arab Reform Initiative for four years. Prior to that, she worked at the Institut d'études politiques de Paris. Earlier, she was the Director of the Arab Regional Office of the Open Society Foundations (2011-12) in Amman and the Higher Education Program Officer at the Cairo Office of the Ford Foundation (2005-11).

Dr. El Khawaga received her BA in political science from Cairo University, her MA in Sociology of Development from the Sorbonne in Paris, and her doctorate from the Institut d'études politiques, also in Paris.

She is the Director of the Asfari Institute for Civil Society and Citizenship at the American University of Beirut, a co-sponsor and partner of Status/الوضع.

Dr. Hassan Mneimneh acted as the Lebanese Minister of Education and Higher Education in the government of Prime Minister Saad Hariri from 2009 to 2011. Previously, he worked as a professor and as the Director of the Faculty of Letters and Human Sciences at the Lebanese University as well as a journalist for several Lebanese newspapers. He is the author of numerous cultural, political and educational articles that were published in various Lebanese newspapers and magazines. He co-authored several research papers and historical studies in many Arab and international conferences. He was appointed as Vice President of the Lebanese Association for Historical Studies and Researches. Beginning in 2014, Dr. Mneimneh serves as the Chairman of the Lebanese-Palestinian Dialogue Committee.

Dr. Adnan el-Amine is a Professor of Education at the American University of Beirut and one of the founders of the Lebanese Association for Educational Studies (LAES). Receiving his Doctorate from the Sorbonne in Paris, France, he has specialized in the sociology of education, assessment of educational systems, and quality assurance. Since 2010, Dr. Amine has served as the General Coordinator for Quality Assurance in the Arab Countries for UNESCO, a member of the Coordinating Committee of LAES, and General Coordinator for Higher Education at LAES.

Prior to his work at UNESCO and LAES, Dr. Amine was full professor at the Lebanese University until 2008. His research is focused on sociology of education in Lebanon and its neighboring countries, focusing on topics like social inequality of educational opportunities, ideological functions of educational institutions, and student orientation processes. From 2010-2011, Dr. Amine worked with his colleagues on a draft law on establishing national educational quality assurance in Lebanon, as well as on a UNESCO project to establish a regional agency for quality assurance of higher education for Arab countries in general. Dr. Amine is the author of nearly 20 books and more than 30 articles in Lebanese, regional, and international journals.