Fifty young Jordanians, Palestinians hone their technology skills

AMMAN — HRH Princess Basma launched the first “Technological Teen Summit in Arabic” for members of the Intel Computer Clubhouse at the Queen Zein Al Sharaf Institute for Development (ZENID) over the weekend.

Nine members of the Jordanian Hashemite Fund for Human Development’s (JOHUD) three computer clubhouses had an idea to launch a summit in Arabic after recently attending a teen summit in Boston along with 250 other representatives of the Computer Clubhouse Network worldwide. 

Fifty youth leaders from Jordan and Palestine are participating in technological activities and learning workshops at the four-day summit, held under the slogan “You have something in this world; stand up for it,” and sponsored by the US embassy in Amman and Microsoft Jordan.

The summit aims to enrich Arabic content on the Internet in all fields; invest in the technological inspiration and creativity of young Arabs; contribute to finding creative solutions for the challenges that youth face; and develop computer programmes in Arabic.

The summit coincided with the 10th anniversary of establishing the Intel Clubhouse at ZENID.

At the launch, Princess Basma, in the presence of JOHUD Executive Director Farah Daghestani, called for investing in young people’s “positive energy and technological creativity”.

“The Arabic language represents the Arab and Islamic world’s identity, and enhancing Arabic content on the Internet is a vital and important matter,” she said.

The princess also praised the level of partnership between JOHUD, the Intel Computer Clubhouse Network, Microsoft Jordan, the Cisco Networking Academy and the US embassy, reiterating that the partnership has positively reflected on young Jordanians and helped mould their skills, improving their creativity. 

US embassy representative T’errance Favors stressed the importance of launching a summit in Arabic, in a way that improves young Arabs’ achievements in technology.

Microsoft Jordan Director Hussein Malhas highlighted the company’s efforts to support the national educational strategy through its corporate social responsibility programmes as well as the strategic partnership with JOHUD to develop young people’s technological skills.

During the summit, clubhouse alumni shared their experiences in order to stimulate creativity and led workshops focusing on ways to tackle Internet crimes in cooperation with the Public Security Department’s forensic unit.

The launch ceremony also included the screening of a film on the Jordanian participation in the Boston summit, and a creative film on gender-related issues made by the members.

At the end of the ceremony, Princess Basma distributed certificates to Jordanian and Palestinian teens who participated in the Boston summit.

Thai Ambassador to Jordan Piriya Khempon and the cultural chancellor at the Palestinian embassy, Jamal Khaldi, also attended the launch.