JEDDAH, 20 October 2007 — Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah yesterday emphasized the significance of the new world-class university, which is being built in Thuwal, 80 kms north of Jeddah, and said it would boost the Kingdom’s economic, social and cultural development.
Speaking to the Saudi Press Agency on the occasion of the launch of the SR10 billion King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), the king said the new university would serve as a lighthouse of knowledge for the entire mankind.
“It will support national industries and the private sector and help set up new knowledge-based industries,” King Abdullah said. The university will also help in converting innovative ideas and inventions into economic projects, benefiting the country and citizens, he added.
“It will also serve as a cultural channel benefiting the whole humanity in order for them to learn the values of knowledge and tolerance,” he said. King Abdullah will lay the foundation stone tomorrow for the Western-style university, which is set to revolutionize higher education in the Kingdom.
KAUST is being developed as an international, graduate-level research university dedicated to inspiring a new age of scientific achievement in the Kingdom. KAUST is the realization of the decades-long vision of King Abdullah, who wants to improve Saudi Arabia’s education standard to reach world-class levels.
“The establishment of a university for science and technology and scientific research having international standard has been an idea vibrant in my mind for more than 25 years and I thank God for helping us to realize it,” the king said.
Abdullah said KAUST would help Saudi Arabia to have a world-class independent scientific research center, adding that it would act as a scientific base as well as a driving force for the national economy.
“We hope KAUST will become a pioneering project for the future of our country and one of the distinguished research centers in the world for scientific research and innovation, taking care of talented persons in the Kingdom, in the region and other parts of the world,” he said, adding that admission to the university would be based on merit and there would not be any favoritism.
Abdullah said KAUST is designed to become a model for higher education in the Kingdom and elsewhere in the Arab and Islamic world. He emphasized the need to establish more such universities in the Islamic world with workshops, scientists, researchers and talented students.
King Abdullah said he hoped the university would help people in different parts of the world establish closer relations. He stressed the role of knowledge in boosting economic and industrial progress. “We have seen countries that spend more on education achieve greater progress and prosperity.”
The king also announced that KAUST would have research centers for all sciences including Islamic studies. “Compared to others, Muslim countries are far behind in the field of scientific research and we hope KAUST will improve scientific research and create solutions for the challenges facing the Kingdom and the region and create a conducive atmosphere for innovators and the talented in technological areas of strategic importance.” Abdullah said one of KAUST’s main strategies was to attract distinguished scientists from different parts of the world. “King Abdullah’s vision is to establish a university that will match reputable institutions of higher learning in the world, bringing about radical and qualitative changes in the country’s higher education system,” said Nadhmi A. Al-Nasr, interim president of KAUST.
He said the university would focus on higher studies and scientific research, offering master’s-level and doctoral-level courses. The university will initially focus on four interdisciplinary research clusters: resource, energy and the environment; biosciences and bioengineering; materials science and engineering; and applied mathematics and computational science.
When the university opens in September 2009, it will have a faculty including professors, academics and research leaders representing 60 countries. Within the next eight years, the university will have 2,000 students and 600 researchers.
Vice chancellors and senior officials of many top international universities will attend tomorrow’s launching ceremony, said Dr. Jameel Farhan Al-Dandani, interim vice president of the university. The university, which is expected to cost SR10 billion, will be supported by a multibillion-dollar endowment, governed by an independent, self-perpetuating board of trustees.
KAUST’s core campus covers more than 36 million square meters in Thuwal on the Red Sea coast. The university is set to transform Thuwal into a global city. Thuwal, a fishing village, was famous in the past for being the abode of the Harb tribe in the Hijaz.
KAUST has launched a program to recognize excellence in academics and research by doctoral students from across the world. The King Abdullah Scholar Award will provide up to four years of financial support at the university of the recipient’s choosing. KAUST will select approximately 24 King Abdullah Scholars from Saudi Arabia and the world this year.
“The King Abdullah Scholar Awards are intended to recognize the very best young minds in those academic and research areas that are the focal points of KAUST,” said KAUST Interim Provost Ahmad Al-Khowaiter.
“Those selected as King Abdullah Scholars will have a demonstrated potential to be at the forefront of future innovations in science and technology,” he said. The award is the second of two university funded scholarship programs. The KAUST Discovery Scholarship, a separate program announced earlier this year, provides tuition and other financial support to university undergraduates who will enter KAUST as master’s degree students in September 2009 and 2010.
KAUST has already signed cooperation agreements with reputable international educational institutions, including the French Institut Français Du Pétrole (IFP) and the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (IIT Bombay).
“We are gratified by this new relationship with IIT Bombay as a further extension of our collaborative arrangements with other world-class research institutions,” said Al-Nasr, referring to recent agreements to promote research partnerships with the IFP, the US-based Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the National University of Singapore.
