Investment in education will pay Kingdom rich dividends
THE King Abdullah Scholarship Program, in which thousands of Saudis are enrolled, is bound to have far-reaching effects in the Kingdom. King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), for instance, was one of his great assets to education, as I noted a couple of weeks ago in my column.
While KAUST accepts foreign students to study in the Kingdom alongside Saudis, King Abdullah’s scholarship scheme gives Saudis a chance to study abroad and mix with other elite students from other countries. They then return to help create a new nation within the realms of modernity without sacrificing their original heritage.
The idea occurred to King Abdullah a few years ago as he surveyed the country’s educational system and compared it to that of other countries. He resolved to make drastic changes, promising young Saudis the chance to gain expertise abroad and return home to implement in governmental departments what they’ve learned.
With few foreign examples to go by, the king had to depend on his own decisions and the advice of Saudi experts in order to set aside estimated funds for such a huge scheme. There are currently around 148,000 Saudi students studying abroad in countries as near as Great Britain and as far as New Zealand.
This is certainly the largest percentage of scholarship holders worldwide.
Between 2007 and this year, 47,0000 Saudi men and women have graduated from some of the best institutions abroad and have returned home. One can only imagine the impact of such a wealth of knowledge when at least 250,000 return.
A report drafted by Fawzy Bukhari and Brian Denman suggests that this is considered to be the largest fully endowed government scholarship program ever supported by a nation-state.
Demand to incorporate study abroad as part of an overseas experience has never been greater. Overseas study is considered a national priority that seeks to foster international workforce competence for a nation that is in need of skilled Saudi nationals.
The rationale behind the program was conceived when officials realized that skill formation within the country lacked quality and focus and that workforce planning and development would be significantly enhanced by learner mobility that extended beyond its borders to major international universities.
The authors added: “Historically, the offering of overseas scholarship by the Saudi government focused on the capacity for the recipient to subsequently contribute to the benefit of the country. The focus, however, has shifted from meeting the identified needs of the Kingdom to meeting the specific professional and personal needs of individual students,” they said.
A statement by the Ministry for Higher Education says that the KASP is behind the huge development that the Kingdom has witnessed since its inception, as it is indeed a leap forward in the country’s education that is bound to have an impact on its overall progress.
The aim, according to the ministry, is to prepare distinct generations for an information-based society. One of the main objectives of the program is to prepare generations of students or scholars to become qualified in the world of professional competition so as to support Saudi universities and both the private and public sectors.
This phenomenon of wide-scale travel for higher education at immense cost is meant to cut short the road to those ends. These ends mean knowledge in every possible way at whatever the cost. King Abdullah also ordered the planning and implementation of the King Abdullah University for Science and Technology to make it one of the best in the world, with a treasury of $200 billion. It has amazed the world, just as the KASP will do in a few years time.
At a recent meeting of the International Cultural and Educational Foundation (ICET), the program was of particular interest, as many of those attending were keen to learn how their schools could qualify for partnerships and what changes might be afoot.
Universities offering high quality education and a very international environment are at the top of the list of accredited institutions. Dr. Saad Nasser Aldwayan, an international cooperation consultant at the Saudi Ministry of Higher Education, said that with 79 percent of the Saudi population under the age of 40, and 36 percent of the population under the age of 15 years of age, growth potential in Saudi Arabia is far too great to ignore. There are currently 1.5 million students enrolled in higher education, with 5 percent in private institutions. Females make up 60 percent of the student population.
Dr. Aldwayan encouraged attendees to keep a sharp eye on the program, which is continually monitoring participants and looking for new educational institutions for cooperation.
The program came into being in 2007, and tens of thousands of students are racing to join it.
There remains plenty of financial resources, as King Abdullah is keen on continuing to develop this program regardless of the cost and has already extended it twice, with the present phase going on until the year 2020 costing SR9 billion a year.
Like KAUST, it is a prestigious program that is bound to have deep repercussions throughout Saudi, Arab and Islamic world, as it represents a historical landmark calculated to last a long time and effectively represents what amounts to a revolution in learning for both men and women. In their turn, they would make sure that their own children get the best possible chances, for only educated parents see the point of giving their children the best possible education they can afford.
Zvika Kreiger writes in the Chronicle of Higher Education in 2007: “Four years ago, the Kingdom embarked on a fantastically ambitious effort to expand and reform higher education. The ministry’s budget has nearly tripled since 2004 to $15 billion, much of which has been spent on opening more than 100 new colleges and universities. King Abdullah had provided $10 billion of his own money to establish a graduate-level science and technology university, KAUST, instantly making it the sixth wealthiest university in the world. The government has also lifted the decades old ban on private institutions, offering cash and land and building costs for what they hope will become the Harvards and Yales of the Middle East.”
n Farouk Luqman is an eminent journalist based in Jeddah.
