Meet, share, build.

Alaa Khaddaj led an online session on 17 October 2026. He shared advice from his experience with graduate school applications.

The discussion covered program selection, application timelines, and contact with prospective research advisors. Alaa also discussed recommendation letters and statements of purpose. Questions covered funding, master’s and PhD programs, and work experience before a PhD.

Alaa shared his slides and the session recording with the community after the event. Find the slides and recording in Slack.

The session followed Sarah Jabbour’s September introduction to PhD study and applications.

Sarah Jabbour led an online session on 19 September 2026 about PhD study and applications. She discussed research experience, how to choose an advisor, and the documents an application needs.

Her slides also covered research statements, recommendation letters, application costs, and careful use of AI during the application process.

Sarah shared her slides after the session and invited members to continue the conversation in the community’s grad-school channel. Find Sarah’s slides in Slack.

The August call marked a move toward a first-Saturday monthly rhythm. Members joined from different locations for an informal conversation about their work and the AI topics on their minds.

More than 19 members expressed interest in the gathering. The evening brought the community together in Beirut to meet face to face and continue conversations that usually happen online.

Members compared industrial AI and generative AI, including predictive maintenance and proactive manufacturing. The group also discussed agentic AI, skills, MCP, workflows, and where deterministic processes still matter.

The conversation returned to the role of engineers in an AI-first world: domain expertise, judgment, oversight, and the need to keep reevaluating model capabilities as tools improve. Members shared practical experience with Codex, Claude Code, and other coding agents.

The live showcase brought together 12 builders and 12 demos: Sahha, Golden Gate Bridge CAD, an inventory tracker for displaced families, Lebanese Land Search, GoPilot, a spending tracker, a knowledge system, a teaching bot, Family Safety Alerts, a cleaning-services website, Omni Train, and Lebanese News Atlas.

The judging focused on working products, real problems, and meaningful uses of AI. Mohsen Abdelaal’s Sahha placed first and Jessica Chemali’s ParcelScout / Lebanese Land Search placed second.