Gayatri Babel - Founder and Lead Organizer
Gayatri Babel is a senior at the American School of Dubai. Prior to ASD, she studied at Shanghai American School and Jakarta International School. Her interest in civic engagement and leadership stems from her diverse cultural experiences across multiple countries and communities. Gayatri was selected to attend the Civic Leadership Institute (CLI) at John Hopkins University, where she engaged in discussions about complex, societal issues and led service projects in neighboring communities. Gayatri believes that there is a leader in everybody and applied the knowledge she gained from CLI to design and deliver a series of civic leadership workshops for Middle School students. She is also an expert at Mind-Mapping and has worked to promote this as an educational tool to students and teachers in both Dubai and India.
Gayatri’s longstanding engagement with service clubs in international schools across multiple countries has convinced her that there is tremendous synergy in pooling resources and coordinating efforts to make a meaningful impact. She conceived the Civic Engagement Summit to spark a collaborative spirit between similar service clubs across multiple schools in Dubai. |
Kunal Valrani - Communications
Kunal Valrani is currently a junior at the American School of Dubai. He has lived in Dubai his entire life and is now in his 13th year at the school. Kunal loves to serve his community and has been a part of the Student Government Association for three years, as well as many other organizations such as the National Honor Society and Falcon Ambassadors. He believes that young leaders are the most powerful group of people in the world as they determine the future of our society. Bringing together a group of these leaders can have an unspeakable amount of potential. This is the exact reason why Kunal got involved in this project.
While pursuing this ideology, Kunal has been an executive of many large scale inter-school events such as the Dubai High School Bizz Plan event, the Dubai Youth Film Festival, and now the Civic Engagement Summit. Kunal hopes that this summit can form a long-standing network of Dubai’s most passionate young people that can achieve great things in the years to come. |
Samer Aslan - Logistics
Samer Aslan is a junior at the American School of Dubai, and has been at the school since kindergarten. However, he additionally studied at the American School in London for two of his middle school years. Samer believes that his experience in London was crucial in shaping his awareness of cultural diversity since it taught him how to be more informed about differing opinions. Samer exercises and hones his leadership skills through volunteering at PACES, a Palestinian charity that provides opportunities for marginalized Palestinian girls and boys to become better and more informed citizens through sport.
This continuous work with PACES not only taught Samer how to lead and manage logistics, but also how to deal with and learn from cultures unknown to him. In order to nourish his interest in learning about new cultures, Samer has also been learning Chinese for 5 years. Samer chose to take part of the Civic Engagement Summit executive team in order to both learn how to manage a large event and also since the summit has the potential of making a very large impact on the future of inter-school civic engagement in Dubai. |
Antony Awad - Communications
Antony Awad is a junior at the American School of Dubai. He was born in London and lived there for a couple years before moving to Dubai. Coming from a French and Lebanese background, Antony attended a French international school in Dubai (AFLEC) before moving to ASD in 4th grade. Antony has always enjoyed being an active part of ASD’s diverse and stimulating community.
Being part of societies such as the National Honor Society and Mu Alpha Theta has given Antony opportunities to give back to the community through service. He has very much enjoyed taking advantage of these opportunities but is excited to see how the Civic Engagement Summit can broaden the impact beyond what a sole person can do on their own. This is part of the reason why Antony joined the summit organization team, in addition to a desire to learn more about and take part in an ambitious cooperative project such as this one. |
Shinhee Lee - Logistics
Shinhee (Shane) Lee is a junior at the American School of Dubai. Born in Seoul, Korea, Shane studied in Orange County, Southern California, before moving to ASD in Summer 2015. His exposure to a diverse community at ASD has interested him in the variety of possibilities one could accomplish for his or her school community. As a member of the National Honor Society, Shane actively volunteers in and out of ASD to meet new people, build experience, and learn about certain issues within Dubai.
Shane joined the summit organization team to learn how one can effectively take on individual projects and cooperate with nearby groups to accomplish common goals. He believes everyone should take advantage of the unique opportunities we are exposed to in order to make a change for the better as leaders of our communities. Shane is thrilled for the first CES and the new paths of opportunities this summit will open. |