AUS students win honors at prestigious Habib Awards

A total of eight students from American University of Sharjah (AUS) were the recipients of the prestigious Habib Awards at a special ceremony held at the Sharjah Higher Colleges of Technology campus recently. The trophy awards were presented by His Excellency Sheikh Nahyan Bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, UAE Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research and the Chancellor of the Higher Colleges of Technology.

"It was great to have participated in the award, and to see the work of other competitors," said Nadia Eldemerdash, who won first place in the Journalism Category. "It's great to have your work acknowledged. It's also an experience to do something competitive and to work towards more than just a grade. It's important to remember that the whole point of media is to influence the community around you."

The Habib Al Redha Awards for Media Innovation is an initiative of the family of the late Habib Al Redha, a pioneer in the field of media. Recognizing final year students majoring in media and mass communication at colleges and universities in the UAE, the award aims to encourage and sponsor creative students in communication and media in the various universities and colleges of the United Arab Emirates. The Habib Award also aims to encourage creative competitiveness among students to elevate the standard of media graduates in the UAE and teach them the best practices in the region and worldwide. In this year's competition, a total of 462 projects were assessed by 50 judges in two rounds "A Lebanese sound artist called Tarek Atoui made an event where he collected artists from around the world and gave them old recordings of Arabic music to interpret it themselves. We filmed the whole performance and made it into a documentary," said Deena Stevens, a multimedia design student whose documentary entitled Revisiting Tarab, came second in the Documentary Category. Stevens produced the documentary along with her team-mates Naima Abdelwahed and Samar Idris, both visual communication majors.

"My documentary, A Symphony of Letters, was showcased at the Abu Dhabi Film Festival 2011 and I was encouraged by my friends and professor to apply to the Habib Award and submit my documentary again. My film was about Arabic calligraphy and its value for us, how it has changed and how young Arabs use calligraphy to express their sense of identity and fashion, jewelry, design and architecture," said Alanoud Ali, a mass communication student who won third prize for her film.

Visual communication Student Tayma Bittard won second place in the Graphic Design Category, while multimedia design student Yasmeen Salehi won third place. In the Animation Category, multimedia design student Bissan Mustafa won second place alongside her group member Tayma Bittard. In the short film category, multimedia student Omnia ElAfifi won first place, with multimedia design student Sarah Zohair winning third place.