In an email to the NYU Abu Dhabi community, Vice Chancellor Mariët Westermann announced on Feb. 13 that NYUAD will be hosting the current class of Schwarzman Scholars on campus in early March. Schwarzman Scholars are traditionally hosted by Tsinghua University in Beijing, China, but due to current concerns regarding COVID-19 — the recently renamed novel coronavirus —— the scholars will be given the opportunity to relocate to NYUAD to continue their curriculum in the interim.

Schwarzman Scholars is a scholarship program that offers a one-year master’s degree in Global Affairs, in which recipients design an academic plan along with an academic advisor to suit their professional goals. The program was founded and is chaired by Stephen A. Schwarzman, CEO of The Blackstone Group — an American private equity and financial services firm based in New York City. The inaugural class of Schwarzman Scholars was first welcomed in 2016 upon the completion of the construction of the Schwarzman College at Tsinghua University.

The aim of the scholarship program is for students to deepen their knowledge in terms of politics, business or science while also being immersed in an environment in which they can learn about the role of China in global trends and in relation to the rest of the world. The curriculum involves a core program, designed to promote connectivity and communication within the whole cohort, followed by a specialized elective curriculum divided into public policy, economics and business and international studies. The students also have a mandatory language component in the beginning of the program — Chinese for international students and English for Chinese students.

The current class of Schwarzman Scholars that will be hosted by NYUAD includes around 140 students of varied geographical backgrounds, two of whom are alumni of NYUAD — Atoka Jo and Alexander MacKay. The scholars have yet to return to Tsinghua University for their studies and will be coming to NYUAD from various countries. In the email to the NYUAD community, Westermann assured that “all relevant travel regulations, UAE policies and international health guidelines will be strictly adhered to in order to ensure the continued health, safety and wellbeing of our community, and our visitors.”