Middle Eastern Women Invited to Apply for U.S. Legal and Business Fellowships

The U.S. Department of State's Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) announces the opening of recruitment for the 2007 Legal and Business Fellowship Program (LBFP). This fellowship program will provide women from the Middle East and North Africa unique opportunities to learn management, business, and legal skills through a combination of advanced study and internships at top U.S. businesses and law firms.

AMIDEAST will implement the program for MEPI, working with the University of Pennsylvania's Law School and Wharton School and the National Council for International Visitors.

Forty-one young professional women from the region will be selected as fellows. They will be enrolled in a four-week executive-MBA or -LLM academic program at the University of Pennsylvania. They then will be placed in five-month fellowships with large companies and law firms across the United States.

The program is open to women from 17 countries and territories: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, West Bank and Gaza, and Yemen. The application for the program is available at www.amideast.org/lbfp.

 LBFP is an extension of the U.S. Business Internship Program for Young Middle Eastern Women, which brought approximately 80 professional women to the United States for a similar combination of intensive academic work and business and legal internships in 2005 and 2006. Following the U.S.-based programs, LBFP will provide support to alumnae through a quarterly newsletter and networking events in the region.