Top women’s college may open in Abu Dhabi

Matt Kwong

• Last Updated: December 15. 2008 8:30AM UAE / December 15. 2008 4:30AM GMT

ABU DHABI // An elite American women’s college is in talks to open a satellite campus in Abu Dhabi, according to a report.

The 1,300-student Bryn Mawr College, based near Philadelphia, is “in the very early stages” of discussions about expanding to the Middle East, following a faculty trip to the UAE in October.

The school’s president, Jane McAuliffe, an Islamic-studies scholar, told the Philadelphia Inquirer that the Government of Abu Dhabi had courted Bryn Mawr College, and that the administration would make its decision about a possible collaboration by the summer.

“If we were to go to Abu Dhabi, we would be going as educators, as people who have a deep interest in the education and empowerment of women,” she said.

“The notion of being able to educate future women leaders in a part of the world that very much needs leadership is very exciting.”

Notable Bryn Mawr alumni include Emily Greene Blach, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1946, the Saudi Arabian anthropologist Mai Yamani and the actress Katharine Hepburn.

mkwong@thenational.ae