Just Falafel, a leading fast food chain in the UAE, said it has shortlisted 15 finalists for its major scholarship programme under its  ‘Help Us Help You’ campaign.

The drive was launched in January tying together social media, creative arts and academic support through an innovative initiative via its facebook page, said a ststement from the company. The winner will be announced on April 25.

The scholarship was open to students of any age, from any country applying for higher education or pursuing the arts. All that the contestants had to do was simply express in a 120-second video why they merit this scholarship.

Voting was opened to the public and decided online by Just Falafel’s facebook fans who selected the top 100 videos by ‘liking’ and ‘sharing’ the selected short videos.

Besides the UAE, responses to the designated video theme came from places as near as Lebanon, Nepal and India to as far as Turkey, Australia and Malaysia, proving true that the global outreach through social networking is boundless.

The responses varied from students succeeding in attaining their dream jobs in various fields; the ability to lead an industrial revolution in their home country and aid its economy; conduct viable medical research; and set up a mountainous trekking camp for explorers and nature revellers.

From this, 15 entries were then shortlisted by a panel of judges, and the candidates were asked to submit an additional video in response to the subject: Should you win this scholarship, how would you pay it forward?”

This initiative launched by the region’s fastest growing fast-food chain, aims to introduce the notion of giving back to the community, resulting in a full circle of philanthropy - seen through the submitted videos of aspiring dreams.

The winner will be awarded a full paid tuition scholarship for the duration of his/her graduation, said the UAE fast food company.

These videos are now available for public viewing and voting on the social network site until April 21, midnight Dubai time, it added.-TradeArabia News Service