Middlesex University hosted by Etihad Airways

Etihad Airways, the national carrier of the UAE, has been making the headlines for its numerous achievements of late. It reported resounding profitability figures within a record 8 years of starting operations. It completed a much talked about partnership deal with Air Berlin adding 157 destinations and giving it access to 35 million new passengers. The prestigious World Travel Awards named Etihad Airways World's Leading Airline for the third year in a row. What enables this airline to achieve these admirable accomplishments and what can young business graduates learn from Etihad's success stories? To find answers to these questions a group of 20 students and four staff members from Middlesex University Dubai visited the Headquarters of Etihad Airways in Abu Dhabi on 5th February 2012. The day-long field trip was organised by the Careers and Employability Service (CES) at Middlesex University Dubai for students studying in Marketing and Tourism programmes. Majority of the participants were in the final year of their Honours undergraduate programmes at Middlesex. During the field trip, Middlesex students got the opportunity to experience take-off in an aircraft simulator and witnessed fire-safety demonstration in a specialised facility. They toured the state-of-the-art flight simulators on which Etihad trains its pilots and even experienced the finer aspects of Etihad's award-wining luxurious service in a replica of the first class cabin. 'The idea behind such initiatives is that students get to see first-hand what it's like to work in various areas of operations in an organisation like Etihad Airways' said Ms Alveena Javed, CES Manager at Middlesex University Dubai. Mohammad Meraj, lecturer at Middlesex University Business School who accompanied his students on the field trip commented that, 'the notion that the process of learning is confined to the ivory towers of universities is an obsolete one. Learning is a social process and we integrate industry initiatives like this field trip into our curriculum to allow students to learn beyond the traditional classroom. It helps them translate the knowledge from the classroom into professional skills they can apply in the workplace.'