El Hassan Abdel Fattah is graduating in mechanical engineering June 12 after an undergraduate adventure that saw him learning and working over a span of more than 14,000 kms and in temperatures that covered 100 degrees on the thermometer, from -50 C to 50 C.

The high-achieving student, who grew up in Dubai and started university in neighbouring Sharjah before moving to Canada, finished his final year with a perfect 12.0 average, and is set to start a full-time permanent job at Kraft Foods’ Hamilton confectionery plant – the same facility where he had completed a co-op term  as a plant engineering intern last summer.

Prior to that, he had completed co-op terms in locales ranging from Sharjah to Norman Wells, NWT, near the Arctic Circle. In Norman Wells, Fattah immersed himself in Dene and Metis culture, and volunteered as a tutor with local high school students.

Fattah talks about his experience below: