Elie Samia

Elie Samia
President of CHARACTER

Elie Samia has a 30-year experience in strategic consulting, youth leadership empowerment and development. He was appointed Assistant Vice President for Outreach and Civic Engagement in 2014. He has served at the Lebanese American University (LAU) since 1991 as a lecturer of diverse courses in the Social Sciences department (a position he fills to this day) and as Director of Guidance on the Byblos campus (from 2005 to 2010). He was named Executive Director of Outreach and Civic Engagement in 2010.

Most notably, over the past decade Elie Samia has successfully led key special programs at LAU that underscore the university’s commitment to civic engagement and outreach: Global Classrooms-LAU Model UN in Lebanon, Global Classrooms International in New York, LAU’s Model Arab League, LAU’s Model European Union, LAU’s Model African Union and the USAID-funded University Scholarship Program.

In his role as AVP, Elie Samia manages the Outreach and Civic Engagement department, overseeing the above-mentioned initiatives, training the students participating in the Harvard World Model United Nations and managing strategic USAID higher education scholarships. He is also responsible for forging strategic alliances with influential civic engagement and philanthropic organizations and for coordinating the strategic plans.


Elie Samia founded multiple leadership academies and programs:

  • Constitutional and Educational Academy for Leaders (HFSHD)
  • Moderation and Justice Academy for Leaders (MAJAL) in partnership with HFSHD
  • Global Outreach and Leaders (GOAL) at LAU New York Academic Center in 2013 and every year since then
  • LAU NGO fair starting 2010 – present
  • Outreach and Civic Engagement Across Nations (OCEAN)
  • LAU NGO application
  • BUS. 299 (Civic Engagement to all Business Students)
  • Leadership training to dozens of financial institutions
  • Leadership and Civic Engagement Certification
  • Commercial Negotiations Program
  • MUN Leadership Academy
  • Model Arab League program with the National Council on US Arab Relations
  • Model European Union Simulation Model
  • Outreach and Leadership Academy in Saida
  • Outreach and Leadership Academy in Solidere

Elie Samia is the author and co- author of several books and articles about peace building, leadership development and the political economy of developing countries. He gave more than 750 workshops to a wide audience ranging from youth associations to corporate employees in Lebanon and abroad about educational leadership, negotiations, emotional intelligence, team building and project management, strategic thinking,

conflict resolution, situational management, and educational management.


Samia was a strategic consultant at IFCAM “the university of Credit Agricole Bank “, at Bank Audi, Bank of Beirut, Bank Med and other financial institutions. He spread a culture of sales management at Bank Saudi-Fransi in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.


Samia holds a B.A. in Political Science, an M.A. in Political Development (both from the American University in Cairo), and a DEA in Political Sociology from Saint Joseph University with a prospective doctorate from Paris