Posts Tagged ‘qatar’

Discussing ​Smart Cities in Doha​

We have been in Doha (Qatar) from March the 14​th to the 17th​ together with an interesting team from the SEK Group and Universidad Camilo José Cela (UCJC). ​I had the opportunity to lead a workshop and a conferences, the workshop was at the Ministry of Public Works, on March 15th and the conference was prepared for a group of 40 people, including corporate managers, Latins in Qatar and the Spanish Ladies in Qatar at the Intercontinental Hotel The City. The organization of Damián Fernández @damianmadrid was of outmost value along the stay.

I presented the book I co-authored and published recently on smart cities, as well as the interdisciplinary projects we are aiming at around the smart city idea at the different schools at Universidad Camilo José Cela, involving architecture, communications, health science, education and sports.
2016 Public Works Authority Doha Olga Gil pic

Attendants shared questions about the smart city concept.

The size of the public allows for networking of peers. We have keept the cohort small at 10 participants to the workshop and 30 to the conference. Since they are from across the world and public and private experts are included, the network of individuals allows to discuss smart cities and their challenges from a broad perspective. Some of the attendants to the workshop, specially the engineers, emphasized the importance of having happy people in the cities, and being able to have measures of happiness, rather than overbuild or embed information and communications technology into urban territories. This is an interesting insight. I always learn from people coming to conferences and workshops, as they pose new questions and highlight facets that could have been overlooked. The work of Coates on the geopolitics of the Gulf countries in recent years was very useful to prepare and adapt to the local context.

The SEK team, together with the UCJC team presented interesting pre-college summer courses offered under the heading “Humanities, Science and Technology” for 16 and 17 year-old students to parents. ​SEK Group was founded 120 years ago, and has become widely as the most well-known private educational institution in Spain. SEK has six schools in Spain, one in Dublin (Ireland), one in Les Alpes (France) and a school in Doha (Qatar). SEK schools schools follow the International Baccalaureate (IB) curriculum, and use English and Spanish as the languages of instruction in Spain. In Doha Arabic and Spanish are taught as foreign languages. In Spain SEK group has a 100% success rate for students´ University Entry Exams. SEK Group together with Camilo Jose Cela University add up over 17,000 students attending the educational institutions every year.

This post is work in progress, as I will be reflecting on all the data gathered along the stay. Let me, for the time being share these pictures with you.​
Olga Gil y grupo SEK UCJC
1 P1020885 copia
1 P1020899 copia
1 P1020916 copia

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Branding, Education for the Future, Local Government, Smart Cities No Comments »

Destino Doha, en Catar​

​D​esde el lunes 14 de marzo estaré en Catar. Este destino es emocionante, viajo a la cuna de la civilización, M​esopotamia. En la cuna de la civilización hoy existe una ciudad futurista, Doha, punteada de rascacielos, que acoge un gran porcentaje de población expatriada. ​Me estoy preparando para dar una conferencia y un workshop sobre ciudades inteligentes. La primera, en el Ministerio de Transportes. La segunda con empresas españolas, Latins in Qatar y las Spanish Ladies in Qatar, con el gentil apoyo de el Spanish Council, que aglutina a las empresas españolas que operan en la zona.

En Catar solo el 15%​ de la población e​s​ catari, el resto son inmigrantes de origen muy diverso. Una de las habitantes de Catar es antigua alumna mía en UC3​M, Maider Pérez de Heredia. Maider es coatora del libro ¿Cómo se Gobiernan las Ciudades? Ciudades Inteligentes que hemos presentado con anterioridad en la Universitat Rovira i Virgili de Tarragona y CEOE (Madrid)​. Me ilusiona verla, que me cuente su experiencia y ver cómo está.

Estas son algunas de las empresas miembros del Spanish Council in Qatar:

Captura de pantalla 2016-03-20 a las 22.05.45

​En la preparación de este viaje me está siendo muy útil el trabajo de Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, Especialista em Kuwait, de la London School of Economics and Political Science, publicado en la Revista Brasileira de Estratégia e Relações Internacionais en 2012: “Cooperacao sul-sul e a mudanca do papel dos estados do golfo”, descargable en pdf aquí​. El trabajo de Coates explica el cambio del rol geopolítico en los países del golfo que se produce tras la segunda guerra mundial, y más aun, tras la crisis de 2009.

Conferencia Olga Gil smart cities en Doha
¿Que impresión nos causará Doha? ¿Qué aspectos del crecimiento exponencial de esta ciudad podemos ligar al concepto de ciudad inteligente?

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Smart Cities, trips No Comments »