Prestigious IARE 2021 Best Academician Award For APU Lecturer

Honoured with three awards for the year 2021

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​Mr Mafas Raheem, Lecturer, School of Computing has dedicated the last 15 years working in the field of digital transformation in sectors ranging from data science to business analytics to health, automobiles, and agriculture.

Apart from his technology prowess, Mafas is also recognised as an outstanding lecturer and researcher. 

Mafas recently received the Best Academician of the Year Award (Male) (Overseas) at the 3rd International Academic and Research Excellence Awards (IARE) 2021, hosted by the GISR Foundation, India on 11 September 2021.

The GISR Foundation was founded by a group of prominent scholars to encourage research and development efforts in various disciplines.

The awards recognise and honour outstanding talents, as well as inspire, elevate, empower, share, and grow with others.

Mr Mafas was selected as one of the few outstanding personalities following a comprehensive examination and recommendation by jury members based on document evidence such as teaching experience, number of publications in the field of data science, number of international conference participation, PhD (reading), Master student supervision, and certifications.

Earlier in April 2021, he received the Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Award, organised by Analytics India Magazine (AIM) in collaboration with SkillUp 2021.

This event is India's largest, and first-of-its-kind virtual education exhibition dedicated solely to Data Science and AI enthusiasts.
 
Mafas accepted the prize at a virtual ceremony conducted during the exhibition, which honours excellence and dedication in the field of education.

Nominees for this award are subjected to a rigorous evaluation procedure by an international committee, which looked at nominees' contributions to data science, analytics, machine learning, and artificial intelligence teaching, research, and publications.

What makes this achievement even more remarkable is that Mafas was nominated for this award by former APU students with whom he definitely left an indelible impression.

A month later in May 2021, Mafas received the UIJIR Academic Research Foundation's Young Researcher Award.

This prestigious award was for research in healthcare, which was published in an Elsevier Scopus Indexed international journal titled Deep Neural Network to Predict Diabetes: A Data Science Approach.

Mafas' research stood out among more than 150 submissions to the award's organising committee, which included work from a wide variety of fields.

Impressive accomplishments indeed as Mafas is an alumnus of APU. He moved to Malaysia a few years ago from Sri Lanka to pursue his Master's degree in Data Science and Business Analytics.

Following his Master's degree, Mafas decided to pursue his longstanding dream of becoming an educator and joined our School of Computing. 

Delighted with his awards, Mafas said, “These milestone achievements, gives me the motivation and drive to continue to improve my efforts by constantly going above and beyond in assisting students at all levels with absolute dedication and commitment.”