Abu Dhabi :

Determination has been a major drive in Dr Mona Al Bahar’s career.

As a freshman at UAE University in the 1980s, she was keen to join the social services sector to help revive a profession where there was little or no enrolment of Emirati women.

And at age 18 established a society to assist Emiratis with special needs in Sharjah. Later she became the first Emirati social worker with a doctorate from a US university.

“There is a very negative view in the western world of Arab and Gulf women,” she said.

“They view women as opinionless and weak. I first felt this [while studying for her doctorate] at Ohio State University at the social service college.

“I felt they were all questioning if I could compete with other students as an Arab and a Gulf woman. Some asked me ‘Do you feel you can compete and continue?’ That was a big challenge and I took a decision to be an example and to prove not only myself, but the Arabic, Emirati women.”

In 1997, Dr Al Bahar obtained her doctoral degree and was awarded the Morris Cornell Distinguished Researcher Award. Her name was engraved at the university’s entrance alongside those of other winners.

Once back in the UAE, Dr Al Bahar returned to UAE University, where she worked as an assistant professor for several years.

Later, she returned to her home emirate of Dubai, where she joined the Dubai Foundation for Women and Children, which provides refuge and support to the most vulnerable.

In 2011, Dr Al Bahar then received an unexpected phone call. Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President and Ruler of Dubai, chose her as a Federal National Council member.

She is now one of the most vocal women on the council.

“Entering the FNC was a turning point in my career,” she said.

“It widened horizons and provided experience I would not have gained in any other entity or job.

“Working in the FNC carries its own challenges. And I, in all honesty, am thrilled with this experience because it helped me to discover sides of myself and my abilities I would not have been introduced to without this experience.”

She was one of the first to ask to join the council’s education, media and youth committee, where she was later elected chairwoman.

She also supported the country’s first children’s rights legislation and pushed the council to pass a controversial clause in the law allowing specialists unprecedented power to remove children from their homes if found to be in imminent danger. With the public, she has repeatedly tried to keep herself available to those who need her, even taking part in a public majlis to allow as many Emiratis to approach her as possible. As much as her profession has helped her in the FNC, her former students’ words serve as a testament to how important her decision to join her field was all those years ago.

“When a student comes to me and says ‘Thank you doctor, you changed a lot in my life’, I consider that a crown,” she said. “It is a drive and reassures me that my profession was the right choice.

“When I see a positive change in these students, either in their thinking or their personal life, that makes me love my profession more.” With her four-year term of office near its end, she is unsure of what life post-FNC will bring, but is confident it will involve academia and coffee.

“My passion for coffee drove me to establish a coffee museum with a few friends in Dubai,” she said.

“This project was an idea and a dream. With work, the dream became a reality.”

The museum is the first of its kind in the UAE and the second in the Middle East, in Al Fahidi, Bur Dubai, where visitors can learn about the origins of coffee.

source: http://www.thenational.ae / The National / Home> UAE> Arts & Lifestyle / by Ola Salem / March 07th, 2015