 
The
Youth Zone
HARIRI FOUNDATION PROGRAMS
Its activities comprise educational,
academic and cultural programs.
The
University Loan Program
This
is the most important program in the Hariri Foundation. It makes it
possible for students to secure loans that cover all or most of
their tuition fees, housing accommodation, transportation, books,
etc. according to their needs and on the basis of certain criteria.
Academic qualifications as delineated by the Hariri Foundation
are based on:
- An achievement test given in
collaboration with the American University of Beirut (AUB)
- The student's rank in his/her
school
- The student's Baccalureate grades
- Entrance examination to AUB
Parents'
need for financial assistance to cover university fees based on a
field questionnaire carried out by a body of specialists in the
Hariri Foundation.
The yearly budget made available by the Hariri Foundation.
The
Hariri Foundation continues to grant loans to those who meet all
of its conditions, particularly those based on success with good
averages and regular attendance at all classes.
In
this respect, it is reported that up to June 1996 around 32,000
students were granted loans. They are distributed as follows:
Lebanon 20,322
US and Canada 3,100
France, Europe
and N. African Countries 5,626
Total 29,048
In
addition, 2,800 students joined the Special English Training
Program.
Graduating Students from
Lebanon 12,258
US and Canada 1,721
France, Europe
and N. African Countries 2,546
Total 16,525
Of
these, there are 4,000 engineers and more than 1,500 doctors. The
percentages in the other major fields of specialization are as
follows:
Business Administration 22%
Engineering 18%
Medical Sciences 12.5%
Humanities 12%
 Others
are distributed among the technical sciences, agriculture, law,
political science, and the arts. However, around 3,800 students
are still continuing their education in Lebanon and abroad, mainly
in France and the US.
Still
others have either discontinued their courses of study and dropped
out or have failed to meet promotion or graduation requirements.
This made it possible for the Hariri Foundation to grant loans to
new applicants who could benefit from them. Lastly, others'
courses of study were restricted by language proficiency, or they
joined the Lebanese University and were therefore in no need of
loans.
The
Hariri Foundation reaffirms its stand on the policy of the
settlement of loans after students graduate and start working.
Their
return to the Hariri Foundation will reinforce the responsibility
shared by all the present generations and those coming after them.
They realize through their personal experience that they are
better qualified to pave the way for others to benefit from
foundation loans as the Hariri Foundation has done for them.
University Training
Programs
As
a result of the civil war the level of foreign language acquisition
suffered a lot, and consequently it affected the young generation
drastically. Students became deficient in English and failed to meet
the minimum score for admission. They were thus barred from joining
the university although they qualified for admission in all other
respects. To remedy this situation, the Hariri Foundation devised
intensive language programs to make it possible for students to
overcome the language barrier as a prerequisite to university
admission. This program comprised the following components.
Special English Training
 In
collaboration with AUB, the British Council, AMIDEAST, and the
Lebanese American University (LAU), the Hariri Foundation managed
in 1985 to send its students to the above institutions to become
proficient in English. The program at AUB is unique because the
foundation has arranged to have the SET program instructors join
teacher training sessions in Cyprus every summer. The trainers are
usually American or British TEFL experts.
The Preparatory Year Program
Hariri
Foundation experts prepared this program and implemented it in
1986-87. Its aim was to help students continue their education in
French in Lebanon or in France. The Hariri Foundation had
previously sent 2,500 students in two groups to France to improve
their French; and quite a number joined French universities,
whereas others returned to Lebanon and continued their course of
study here. This program was implemented in two centers: in
Tripoli and in Beirut. Both centers were provided with the most
advanced audio-visual equipment and were run by highly trained
instructors in France.
The
length of the period one stays in this program is ten months (40
weeks) with an average of 40 sessions, half of which is devoted to
intensive French language learning; the other half, for
mathematics, sciences, with emphasis on laboratory applications.
2,777
students benefited from this program in France and 710 in Lebanon.
Some of them joined French universities and technical institutes (IUT),
whereas the others joined similar institutes in Lebanon. The
program was discontinued in 1991 after the security condition in
the country was restored. The Hariri Foundation then concentrated
on granting loans to those students who continued their education
in Lebanon.
University Student Training
Program
 In
1985 the Hariri Foundation sent 144 university graduates, mainly
engineers, to be retrained and to keep abreast of new developments
in their respective fields after they had been given intensive
English training. After one year of its inception, the program was
discontinued as most of the applicants preferred to do their MA
programs in their universities. Hence, there was no real need to
continue such a program.
The Medical Training Program
The
Hariri Foundation designed this program specifically for the
benefit of Lebanese doctors who had completed their university
education abroad and wished to continue their specialization in
Lebanon. This program prepared the participants both
linguistically and academically. It started operating in 1987 in
collaboration with the AUB Medical School but was later housed in
the Makassed Association Hospital. However, it continued to
function under the administration of AUB itself. The period of
study in this program, which combined theory and practice, is one
year leading to postgraduate study in medicine. The number of
those who have benefited from this program thus far is 126
doctors.
Planning
and guidance to make available various fields of specialization
Having
established a system for granting loans, the Hariri Foundation
turned its attention to having a guidance program which will
inform the many applicants of what is available on the market and
what the needs of the labor market are. In spite of the
unavailability of the required statistics necessary for future
planning, the Hariri Foundation took the following steps to ensure
the attainment of this objective.
A
study on current manpower and the needs of the labor market in both
Lebanon and the Arabian Gulf states was conducted by TEAM at the
request of the Hariri Foundation.
This
240-page study, in addition to its appendices, served a tremendous
purpose in that it pointed out the fields whose labor needs have
been satisfied and the others which are experiencing shortages.
Hence, the students were well-advised of the market needs which
would help them choose the appropriate careers.
A list that
comprises the various fields of specialization available in US and
European universities was prepared. It contains ten major parts,
which include several sub-specialties; and the Hariri Foundation
has adopted it in guiding its students as well as in gathering
informative statistics since 1987.
The
needs for specific fields in the various parts of Lebanon were
delineated, particularly in medicine and engineering.
Along
those lines, the granting of loans was directly influenced by
those needs, by the number of students the Hariri Foundation had
sent abroad for further study, and by the availability of
different specialists in the part of the country where they are
badly needed. This ensured that the basic human and development
needs of each region are well accounted for.
Career Guidance Program
It
has become evident to the Hariri Foundation that quite a number of
students change their majors after a year or two at their
universities. This is largely due to lack of counselors in high
schools to guide students in their choice of careers. To remedy
this situation, the Hariri Foundation took the following steps:
It
had an agreement with AUB which stipulates that a career guidance
center will be established at AUB whose basic functions include
the following:
a- Assist the SET program students in discovering their own
interests, backgrounds and capabilities to choose the proper
career. Through various sessions, the students are made aware of
which careers exist, what they are, and the prescribed course of
study that pertains to each.
b- Make students aware of the fact that they should select the
field of specialization that suits their own potentials and their
previous preparedness in that field. Elements that relate to
parents' wishes, their friends' influence, financial income or
social status should not be considered when choices are made.
c- Plan on having career sessions for Hariri Foundation secondary
school students as well as for those from other secondary schools
in Beirut, Tripoli and Sidon. These meetings are meant to engage
students in the act of discovering their own personal interests.
The
Career Guidance Center provided the following services:
- Guided more than 5,200 students from Hariri Foundation schools
and those attending the SET Program at AUB to pursue the course of
study that suits their abilities and interests.
- Acquired audio-visual references on technical education that
introduce many technical fields of specialization.
- Planned panel discussions on various careers in the labor market
relating to press, information, medicine, languages, education,
teaching, social work, industry, law, jurisprudence, engineering,
etc. Experts in the field participated as panelists.
- Organized yearly meetings between students and university
officials for this purpose.
- Prepared detailed studies on the different university fields of
specializations and made them available them to students.
The
Career Guidance Center published a book called The Future Is of
Your Choice. It has become available to high school students
all over Lebanon as a reference source on careers and areas of
specialization in the world. It is in ten parts: the first
delineates the fields of specialization in Lebanon, whereas the
other nine provide information on 550 specialties, such as
engineering, business administration, medicine and the like.
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Hariri Foundation
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