The UOD President, Dr. Dawood Sulaiman Atrushi, along with the deans and professors of the medical colleges and the international relations officers at the UOD, received an Italian delegation at the Convention Center on October 14, 2023. The delegation that paid a visit to the UOD was mainly from the Italian Sassari University, the University Hospital San Rafael, and AISPO – Italian Association for Solidarity Among People, that aids the two Italian universities in the field of medical programs development.

The delegation that consisted of the following: (AISPO President, ProfeiFabio Ciceri, the Sassari University Emeritus Professor, Piero Cappucinelly, AISPO Director and Vice President, Febrico Chiodi, KRI Desk Officer, Rebecca Zanuso, AISPO Team Leader, Alessandra Rossi, and AISPO Project Manager, Bakhtiyar Ahmed); met with the UOD officers for initiating collaboration regarding medical fields so as to improve the services and knowledge delivered to the students of the medical colleges through many ways that were discussed in the meeting like; staff and students mobility, capacity building, curriculum development, and the extension of further specializations in these colleges especially in the College of Nursing.

During the meeting, the deans of the medical and health colleges at the UOD expressed their points of view on what their colleges need to reach the highest qualities of study and research. Their suggestions were approved by the UOD's President and were welcomed by the delegates from the two Italian universities and AISPO. The delegates, on their side, made their suggestions that serve the UOD'S colleges. On of the suggestions was to create research groups of students among the UOD and the Sassari University, in addition to research groups of professors of the two universities to raise the quality of research done to meet global research levels. Also, the possibility of developing internships for MA and PhD students to the Sassari University and the University Hospital San Rafael was discussed.

It's worth mentioning that the College of and the College of Health Sciences at the UOD have already started a project with Sassari University, the University Hospital San Rafael, and AISPO since 2021; in the aim of developing these colleges programs, clinical training, students’ safety and laboratories. This project started after several field visits, meetings, and discussions between the College of Health Sciences and AISPO which eventually set an assessment report on the College of Health Sciences. AISPO set goals that were focused on the evaluation of shortages of lab equipment and supplies, checking the missing professionals, revising the curriculum, revising the protocols of students’ safety, and other points of interest.

It's more likely that this actual collaboration will be extended to include the other medical colleges of the UOD. Yet this meeting will result in further collaboration to have more specializations and different colleges, beyond medical ones, included. The UOD hereby declared its readiness to accomplish more future programs with AISPO, the Sassari University and the University Hospital San Rafael; strengthening the relations with Italian parties, as it already has built relations with institutions in Italy and implemented several projects as a result.

THE UNIVERSITY OF DUHOK

The University of Duhok (UOD) is a public university in the city of Duhok city, which is about 150 km northwest of Erbil (Arbil, Hewlér), the capital of Iraq's Kurdistan Region (KRI). The city is situated in a beautiful valley surrounded by high mountains. The university campus is a large green area in the city's west side that provides an exciting view of the city and surrounding nature. UOD was founded in October 1992 with only two colleges to meet the region's growing demand for graduate professionals. Today, the UOD has a 19-college with 67 departments, nearly 24000 students, and over 4000 academic and administrative staff. Students thrive in one of the best regional academic communities, studying in programs such as Agriculture, Medicine, Veterinary Medicine, Architecture, Engineering, Humanities, Linguistics, Basic Education, and Economics as well as Spatial Planning. UOD has strong engagement through its International Relations with many Higher Education institutions and centres of excellence worldwide, such as Purdue University, Indiana University (IU), New York University (NYU), The University of Noter Dame (ND), The University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UA), BridgeWater State University in the USA, The University of Warsaw - Poland, The University of Glasgow - Scotland, The University of Twente - The Netherlands, Leipzig University, LLC University, University of Oldenburg, The University of Vechta, Europa-Universität Flensburg, TU Dortmund university, THM Giessen University in Germany, The University of Tuscia, The university of Pavia, Sapienza Università di Roma in Italy, The University of Deusto, The University of Barcelona, The University of Granada (UGR) in Spain, Lund University - Sweden, The University of Sussex in the UK, Tampere University - Finland, University of Sharjah and University of Khorfakkan in UAE, and so many more. The University of Duhok is an active member of the International Association of Universities (IAU), The UNIMED, the Mediterranean Universities Union, and The Association of Arab Universities (AARU).

UOD Media; October 16, 2023

Fatima Mahmood

Photo credit: Mohammed AbdulKareem