Universities and educational institutions will face great challenges when they confront the problem of having to accept all high school graduates. The capacity of our universities and colleges is limited. The easy solution, as some universities will find, is to direct more students into theoretical studies which have no future in the job market.
Students will be squeezed into lecture halls that are too small for their number. The only thing to do is to use a microphone and amplifier. The teacher’s role will thus amount to little more than reading from a book.
We have a big problem that was first noted by the Ministry of Planning some time ago. There is a need to expand education after high school whether for a BA/BS or a diploma.
The Ministry of Planning has said that the requirements of the job market are of paramount importance and it believes that we need diploma holders who can actually do something more than we need degree-holding theorists without practical experience. We should have learned from such countries as Germany and Japan that technical studies provide greater success to the individual than other professions. We should realize that it is supply and demand that controls the job market and that diploma holders’ salaries might be higher than that of degree holders.
The bottom line is that factories care more about a person’s productivity than about their title or theoretical qualifications.
We need to steer our high school students into professions that will introduce them into the job market rather than just adding them to the already long list of unemployed.
The problem of unemployment among degree holders is a problem that demands a solution, especially when our young people have specialized in something not needed in the job market. The Ministry of Higher Education has a pressing duty to make sure that graduates do not join the ranks of the unemployed. The big challenge is not in simply accepting all high school graduates in post-secondary institutions but in guaranteeing them jobs after graduation.
- Arab News Local Press 14 September 2003
