KGSP Students Selected for Prestigious Qimam Fellowship

KGSP is proud to congratulate Saleem Aldajani, 2019 graduate of MIT, and Omar Alhazzaa, a rising junior at the University of Michigan- Ann Arbor, for their selection and participation in the Qimam Fellowship in Riyadh this summer.

The Qimam Fellowship was founded in 2018 by McKinsey and Company and Dr. Annas Abedin, a McKinsey alumnus and entrepreneur.  The 12-day program is designed to “to identify, develop, and empower the most promising and distinguished university students in and from Saudi Arabia to achieve their full potential” by providing recipients with access to and training with 200 leaders from over 25 national and international companies within both the public and private sectors.   Through specialized mentorship and training, Qimam facilitates a broad network of talent and collaboration as an investment towards greater growth in the Kingdom; at the conclusion of the fellowship, recipients gain membership to the Qimam Alumni Network, and have their profiles shared with leading HR managers and executives in Saudi Arabia.

In its inaugural year, this highly competitive program selected only 50 students from more than 13,000 applicants—one of whom was Mohammed Almugren, a KGSP and KAUST alumnus.  The prestige of the Fellowship only grew in its second year, with over 18,000 applicants and just a three percent acceptance rate.

After the completion of this prestigious program in summer 2019, Saleem will be matriculating to KAUST to pursue a PhD in Material Science and Engineering.  Omar will next attend a specialized enrichment program through a partnership with KAUST and the STRATE School of Design before returning to the US to continue his undergraduate coursework in Computer Engineering.