Recently the Ministry of Higher Education has been running advertisements in local papers asking Saudis to apply for scholarships for college and post-graduate studies in American universities.
This reminds me of the golden age of the 1970s when large numbers of Saudi students, at both undergraduate and post-graduate levels, had the opportunity to study in the United States. The ministry is now offering Saudi students the opportunity to study medicine and applied health sciences including pharmaceutical studies, engineering, computer, mathematics, physics, chemistry, law, accounting and e-commerce. These are the kinds of specializations desperately needed in our job market.
In the 1970s, the Kingdom was in need of almost every specialty and at that time, the state apparatus was suffering from a shortage of national cadres which meant the government was eager to employ any new graduates, regardless of what they had studied.
The Saudis educated in the United States and Europe during the 1960s and 1970s are the ones, with others, who have been leading the Kingdom’s development and modernization drive. This has, however, been on the decline and was subjected to a series of setbacks, the worst of which followed the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. That was when Saudi-American relations hit their lowest level.
It seems the recent visit by Crown Prince Abdullah to the US has helped correct the situation which caused us in the Kingdom a lot of damage.
No doubt, American universities lead the way in education and are at the top when it comes to international institutions of higher education. The period we spent away from American universities was a great loss. The impact was really felt when Saudi universities began losing members of the Saudi teaching staff without that staff being replaced.
This step taken by the ministry is an excellent investment in developing human resources. Let us hope the ministry will continue this policy to compensate for the losses we suffered over the past few years.
