JEDDAH, 14 July 2005 — The limited seats available in medical colleges and health science schools are preventing more than 70 percent of the students from applying for admission. All of these students have very good grade point averages — over 90 percent. Most of them are forced to continue their education abroad or transfer to other colleges that they do not want just to continue their education.
Many parents are calling for the establishment of more private medical schools to accommodate the number of students graduating instead of sending their kids abroad. Building these colleges inside the country also could direct more than SR500 million to be spent inside Saudi Arabia as well as finding more jobs for Saudi men and women.
Hassan Dulaimi, a Saudi parent, said fathers are facing difficult time finding seats for their graduate sons and daughters in Saudi universities — even if they receive a 95 percent grade. He blames this on the limited seats available. This gives parents two choices, either to send their kids abroad and suffer financially or transfer their major and join another college and face failure.
“My daughter succeeded in passing high school with an average over 90 percent,” he said. “She tried to join the medical college but could not find a place,” he said. “I had to send her to Yemen to continue her education and it cost me SR50,000 a year. Imagine if 10,000 male and female students are studying abroad and paying SR50,000 each. That means a huge amount is being spent outside the Kingdom.”
Jameel Mereani, a parent, said it is important to establish a medical university in the Kingdom with reasonable prices so Saudi males and females may continue their education inside the Kingdom.
“The market is in need of qualified Saudi doctors,” he said. “Many Saudi families are spending huge amounts of money every year so their kids would study medicine abroad. Saudi investors and businessmen should invest in this type of business because they will get the profit they need and would serve the Saudi people.”
Abdullah Al-Masoudi, a parent, is surprised that there are not many private medical colleges despite the need of qualified Saudi doctor for 50 years to come. “Saudi medical colleges accept a very few number of students because of limited availability. They only accept 30 percent of those applying to medical colleges. As for the rest, their families are forced to send them abroad or to study other majors that are not needed in the job market,” he said. “If we have private medical colleges inside, then the money spent abroad will be spent inside the Kingdom and would benefit the local economy.”
Not everyone is so upbeat about the program.
“Businessmen are hesitating in investing in this type of business because of many reasons,” said Yahya Al-Shareef, a Saudi businessman. “One of the reasons is the very long procedure to obtain the permits. We need some incentives to encourage businessmen to invest in this type of activity, such as providing the land and to give investors easy loans.”
