Notre Dame University-Louaize (NDU) and Concordia University, Canada, signed on December 18, 2017, at the NDU main campus, an important “Agreement of Academic Cooperation;” thereby, officially concretizing a relationship for cooperation between the two universities in Education and Research.
In attendance at the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) were: NDU President Fr. Pierre Najem, Vice-President for Academic Affairs at NDU Dr. Elie Badr, the Council of the Deans (COD) members, Concordia President Professor Alan Shepard, and Concordia Chief of Staff William Cheaib.
Concordia University is located in Montreal and is one of Canada's most innovative urban universities, consistently ranked within the top 10 Canadian business schools and within the top 100 worldwide. Further, Concordia was ranked 7th among Canadian and 229th among world universities in the International Professional Classification of Higher Education Institutions, a worldwide ranking compiled by the École nationale supérieure des mines de Paris that uses as its sole criterion the number of graduates occupying the rank of Chief Executive Officer at Fortune 500 companies.
In his welcome address, Fr. Najem welcomed the guests and said, “Our society is becoming less diversified. We face many challenges, and we have to find solutions to overcome these challenges. Lack of diversity has become a universal concern, and our collaboration with Concordia University could be one avenue to counter this trend.”
NDU and Concordia will seek to encourage the development of joint education and research efforts, periodically designating areas for specific collaboration, initially in the area of engineering but could open doors in the future to other areas of cooperation.
For his part, Professor Shepard said, “The modernization of higher education can expand the scope for future generations.”
During the signing, Dr. Badr noted that NDU is in a transformative state and continues to deliver quality education across its three campuses. He said, “NDU is focusing on recruiting high-caliber faculty members and has put plans to strengthen the research culture to benefit the local society and beyond."
Faculty deans briefly discussed their respective Faculties and specifically talked about innovative programs, faculty expertise, and research conducted.
“There must exist appropriate research methodologies and methods,” Dr. Ghazi Asmar, AVP for Research and Graduate Studies, said in his speech. “Research at NDU currently stands out among regional and international universities, and we are looking forward to more progress.”
Mr. Cheaib talked about the “Ace the Case” competition designed to develop case-writing and presentation skills while giving students the opportunity to build relationships with KPMG professionals early in their career.
NDU and Concordia have agreed to explore and implement mutually-rewarding and viable initiatives focused on, among others, different areas of academic cooperation.