New York University Abu Dhabi

In October 2007, New York University announced its intention to open a complete branch campus in Abu Dhabi, financed by the government of the United Arab Emirates.[7] The Abu Dhabi campus was planned by New York University, and the funding mainly came from the UAE government.[4]

The school was first opened in 2008 on a site in downtown Abu Dhabi, where it held various public events such as academic conferences, workshops, and performances.[8] Alfred Bloom, former president of Swarthmore College, was appointed to lead NYU Abu Dhabi as vice chancellor in September 2008.[9] NYU Abu Dhabi accepted its first class of 150 students in September 2010.[4] As of 2010 the college offered liberal arts and science subjects, including engineering.[10] It welcomed Mariët Westermann, former Vice President at The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, former provost of NYU Abu Dhabi, former director of NYU's Institute of Fine Arts, and art historian, as a second Vice Chancellor in August, 2019 [11]

New York University moved the Abu Dhabi campus to a new site in 2014 in the Marina district of Saadiyat Island. It was designed by Rafael Viñoly, an Uruguayan architect,[12] and built by Al-Futtaim Carillion.[13] NYU eventually plans to have 2,000 students at the campus.[4] The university plans to open a graduate school and to make the school a center for research.[10]

President Bill Clinton, the 42nd President of the United States and founder of Clinton Foundation, was the keynote speaker at NYU Abu Dhabi’s inaugural commencement ceremony [14] for 140 graduates held on May 25, 2014.

As a liberal arts college and research university, NYU Abu Dhabi offers 22 majors [20] in the area of Arts and Humanities, Social Sciences, Science, and Engineering that culminate into a B.A. or B.S. degree. As a prerequisite for graduation, students are required to take courses from the core curriculum, which encompasses topics in world literature, social studies, arts and natural science. Over their college years, undergraduates take three 3-week courses in January that count toward their graduation requirement. Students' education also includes a capstone project in their senior year, a project similar to a senior thesis. Additionally, students are encouraged to study up to two semesters at New York University's Global Network sites in Accra, Berlin, Buenos Aires, Florence, London, Madrid, Paris, Prague and Shanghai. The university further provides regional study trips within the United Arab Emirates and to countries in Africa, Middle East and Western Asia.[21]

Selected graduates of NYU Abu Dhabi will be offered special considerations to enroll at New York University's graduate professional schools and programs.[22]

In the future, the university will offer graduate and executive education programs. [23]

NYUAD has over 60 student groups, providing a variety of opportunities for student involvement outside of the classroom. Categories include Academic and Professional; Art, Literature, and Media; Cooking and Food; Culture and Religious; Music and Performance; Outreach and Engagement; Environment and Sustainability; Recreational; Technology; and Sports and Athletics.[28]

NYUAD also boasts a weekly student newspaper The Gazelle, founded in 2013 by Alistair Blacklock and Amanda Randone.[29]

NYU Abu Dhabi is the home of the Desert Falcons [30] sports teams and competes in the Abu Dhabi Inter-University Sports League (ADISL) [31] which runs from October through May and sees competitive play for men’s and women’s teams against other Abu Dhabi universities in football (soccer), basketball, table tennis, cricket, volleyball, and badminton.

NYU Abu Dhabi’s campus has modern, competitive level sports and recreation facilities including a 50-meter swimming pool, performance gymnasium and indoor track, fitness center, climbing wall, squash and racquetball courts, football pitch and multi-use fields, an outdoor track, tennis courts, as well as basketball and multi-use courts.[32]

Shaghaf performing at NYUAD's Battle of the Bands in December 2017.

NYU Abu Dhabi started hosting the UAE's first Battle of the Bands competition in early 2017.

NYU Abu Dhabi faculty and researchers come from universities all over the world to work in its multidisciplinary labs and collaborative research centers.

An article in Nature Asia [33] states that NYU Abu Dhabi chemists developed thin films of ‘smart’ polymers that respond to heat and light, a breakthrough in research that could revolutionize how energy is generated and consumed. The smart materials project is led by award-winning NYU Abu Dhabi Associate Chemistry Professor Pance Naumov, a recipient of the Humboldt Research Award.

NYU Abu Dhabi’s Library of Arabic Literature [34] (LAL) offers Arabic editions and English translations of significant works of Arabic literature, with an emphasis on the seventh to nineteenth centuries. In its first three years, LAL published nine volumes — on literature, law, religion, biography, and mysticism — and more are in production. LAL won high praise in an article by Times Literary Supplement that said, “…the study and teaching of medieval Arabic thought and literary creativity will be revolutionized” by the library's work.

Akkasah Center for Photography [35] at NYU Abu Dhabi collects antique photos from around the Middle East to capture the region’s societal transformation over the last century. In its first year, more than 10,000 photos were curated [36]

NYU Abu Dhabi is an international partner in the XENON100 and XENON1T dark matter experiments taking place at the Gran Sasso Laboratory in Italy. Scientists recorded results that challenge several dark matter models and a longstanding claim of dark matter detection.[37] Papers detailing the results were published in the journals Science and Physical Review Letters. NYU Abu Dhabi Associate Professor of Physics Francesco Arneodo is a collaborating author and leads NYU Abu Dhabi’s XENON research group of graduate students, postdoctoral associates, and student interns.

Collaborating researchers, including scientists from the Center for Global Sea-level Change (CSLC) at NYU Abu Dhabi, published a 2014 paper [38] in the journal Nature that found one of the most sensitive and critical areas of the Earth’s ice in West Antarctica is being affected by sea-level changes in the north and tropical Atlantic, which has been warming for over 30 years.

Notable faculty include:

• Kwame Anthony Appiah, Professor of Philosophy and Law [39]
• Thomas H. Bender, Professor of History [39]
• Godfried Toussaint, Research Professor of Computer Science [39]
• Elias Khoury, Global Distinguished Professor of Modern Arabic Literature [39]
• Anthony Kronman, Global Professor, New York University Abu Dhabi[39]
• Cyrus Patell, Associate Dean of Humanities[39]
• Iván Szelényi, Emeritus Dean of Social Sciences [39]
• Werner Sollors, Global Professor of Literature [39]
• Eugene Trubowitz, Global Professor of Mathematics [39]
• Carol Gilligan, Visiting Professor of Humanities and Applied Psychology [39]
• Kevin O'Rourke, Professor of Economics

The Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Scholars Program (SMSP) [40] is one of two community programs operated by NYU Abu Dhabi. SMSP is intended for undergraduate students at institutes of higher education in the United Arab Emirates other than New York University Abu Dhabi. The other community program is the NYUAD Summer Academy Program [41] which is open to Abu Dhabi-based high school students entering their 11th year. Recipients take academic courses and receive English training and leadership training. They also travel to the United States to see the university's New York campus.

An article appeared in the New York Times regarding labor violations during construction, with workers complaining of their passports being confiscated and of being charged a year's wages in advance to work for little money in poor conditions.[42] Such criticisms have been described as "one of the factors at play in a faculty vote of no-confidence in President John Sexton’s leadership in 2013 [and] Sexton retiring as president in 2016."[43]

In March 2015, NYU professor Andrew Ross was prevented from boarding a plane to NYU Abu Dhabi, prompting him to decry what he felt was an attack on his academic freedom. As he told Slate Magazine, "If someone with my kind of profile and especially my official position ... can be treated this way, what is the value of the protections that are promised for less high-profile faculty in Abu Dhabi? ... My passage to and from the UAE is supposed to be protected, and we’ve been told by our administration that they have agreements with our Abu Dhabi partners about protecting academic freedoms, and now it turns out that they really don’t have that kind of influence.”[43]

• Americans in the United Arab Emirates

• Official website