SpeakerDr. Shaikha Lobna bint Ali Al-Khalifa currently serves as Acting Director of the Higher Education and Vocational Training Institutions’ Performance Review Directorate at the Education and Training Quality Authority (BQA) in the Kingdom of Bahrain. Since August 2018, she has held the post of Director of Higher Education Performance Review Directorate, having joined BQA in March 2015 on secondment from the University of Bahrain, where she served as an Academic Affairs Consultant and Expert until 2018. In the same year, she also acted as Director of the National Qualifications Framework Operations Directorate. Dr. Al-Khalifa has over 25 years of experience in higher education, beginning her career as a Teaching and Research Assistant at the University of Bahrain in 1998. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Politics from Cairo University (1994), a Master of Arts in International Relations from the University of Nottingham (1997), and a PhD in Political Economy from the University of Leeds (2007). Additionally, she earned a Master's level qualification in Academic Practice from York St John University in 2008, accredited by the UK Higher Education Academy. Her professional expertise spans academic accreditation and quality assurance reviews of institutions and programs. She has led multiple reviews in Bahrain and served as both chair and member of review panels in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Dr. Al-Khalifa also spearheaded BQA’s successful initiative to obtain international recognition from the World Federation for Medical Education (WFME). She has actively contributed to numerous regional and international conferences, organizing sessions aligned with her academic and quality assurance background, and has trained external reviewers for institutional and program evaluations. She has served on national committees and was a Board Member of the Arab Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ANQAHE) in 2023 and of the Association of Quality Assurance Agencies of the Islamic World (IQA) from February 2022 to December 2024. On 16 January 2024, Dr. Al-Khalifa received the 1st Class Medal of Competence from His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al-Khalifa in recognition of her contributions to higher education and quality assurance in Bahrain.
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