Successful Fourth Edition of the “Ithra Youth” Summer Programme Launched by AlMabarrah AlKhalifia Foundation

Manama – Bahrain: AlMabarrah AlKhalifia Foundation (MKF) launched a package of summer training programmes for “Ithra Youth” students, with the participation of nearly 74 male and female students during the period from mid-July until the beginning of this August, in cooperation with Kuwait Finance House, the McDonald’s restaurant chain and Gulf Petrochemical Industries Company.

A total of 65 students took part in the training programme at the McDonald’s restaurant chain, which ran for three weeks. The students were distributed across a number of branches and assigned various tasks designed to strengthen the spirit of cooperation and teamwork, and to teach them how to cope with pressure and complete work in the appropriate manner. At the end of the period, the McDonald’s chain celebrated the graduation of the participating students in the form of a competition, in which participants prepared a report about McDonald’s covering the restaurant’s history, their own experience and impressions, the values they had gained, the strengths and weaknesses of the branches, how the branches could be developed, and what the training programme had added to them. The prize was a one-week job opportunity at the main branch immediately after the winning students were announced.

Meanwhile, 10 students took part in the Kuwait Finance House training programme, which extended over one week and aimed to consolidate practical skills and activate a range of positive qualities in the students through training on how to deal with customers and visitors, how to handle pressure at work, and how to instil self-confidence, all in order to realise the values of taking responsibility and to strengthen the spirit of cooperation, affection and teamwork. The participants concluded the practical programme by presenting a project idea to the management of Kuwait Finance House.

The programme also included a field visit to Gulf Petrochemical Industries Company (GPIC) to learn about its operations and its role in the community, with the aim of encouraging the practical and voluntary side of the students and developing their positive qualities. Through these programmes, AlMabarrah AlKhalifia Foundation seeks to instil a set of educational values in young men and women, in pursuit of creating a generation that is socially, psychologically and intellectually balanced, able to serve its community and nation and armed with noble values.

Among the objectives the Foundation aspires to achieve is introducing students to the concept of community service and volunteering, given its importance in building the student’s character. This contributes to developing a sense of responsibility by allowing them to apply their ideas on the ground according to carefully studied strategies, which in turn helps develop their ability to take charge of their work and to withstand work pressures in order to ensure success and adaptation within the work environment, while instilling self-confidence and strengthening the spirit of cooperation, affection and teamwork.

Prior to launching this year’s programme, AlMabarrah AlKhalifia Foundation reviewed the training and practical applications that students had received through the “Ithra Youth” programme over the past three years, with a view to consolidating concepts and practical activities during the summer holiday.

It is worth noting that AlMabarrah AlKhalifia Foundation is a non-profit organisation established on 30 May 2011 in the Kingdom of Bahrain to support and enhance the education sector in the Kingdom by developing a community capable of reaching its fullest potential and capabilities to achieve the desired goals, as well as empowering Bahraini citizens to fulfil their ambitions through programmes and projects founded on the principle of quality and excellence.