The American University in Cairo (AUC) and Community Jameel celebrated the 35th anniversary of the Abdul Latif Jameel Centre for Middle East Management Studies (Jameel Centre), a landmark institution for business studies and entrepreneurship, at an event on 17 February at the AUC Rare Books and Special Collections Library (RBSCL).
At the event, George Richards, director of Community Jameel, presented a framed print of a photograph of the Jameel Centre—taken by AUC graduate Ebrahim Bahaa-Eldin—to Lamia Eid, dean of AUC Library and Learning Technologies, and Stephen Urgola, associate dean and archivist, RBSCL.
The photograph is part of a series commissioned by Community Jameel to document the architectural and historical significance of the Jameel Centre, and which has been added to the RBSCL’s digital collection for research and scholarship.
Established at the AUC Tahrir Square campus with support from the Jameel family, the Jameel Centre opened on 27 February 1989 at a ceremony attended by the late Abdul Latif Jameel and his son, Mohammed Jameel, who later founded Community Jameel to continue the family’s commitment to community service.
Envisioned as a focal point for advancing management education and fostering innovation in the Middle East, the Jameel Centre has remained a cornerstone of AUC’s commitment to developing entrepreneurial talent, evolving into an integral part of The GrEEK Campus, Cairo’s first technology and innovation hub established at the Tahrir Square site in 2013.
AUC and Community Jameel have gone on to develop their partnership over the years, including efforts to combat poverty and climate change in Egypt and the Middle East. In 2020, Community Jameel supported the establishment of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) regional office of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), a global research centre working to reduce poverty by ensuring that policy is informed by scientific evidence, hosted at the AUC Onsi Sawiris School of Business.
Anchored by a network of more than 1,000 researchers at universities around the world, J-PAL conducts randomised impact evaluations to answer critical questions in the fight against poverty. In 2019, J-PAL co-founders Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, with longtime affiliate Michael Kremer, were awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics for their pioneering approach to alleviating global poverty.
With Community Jameel’s support, J-PAL MENA at AUC has collaborated with the Ministry of Planning, Economic Development and International Cooperation to launch the Egypt Impact Lab in 2022 and the Hub of Advanced Policy Innovation for the Environment in 2025.
