The massive infrastructure development taking place in far-flung areas of the Kingdom including the two holy cities of Makkah and Madinah may augur well for the national economy, but the fact that it has not been matched with proper schooling facilities has been a cause of concern not only for the expats but also for Saudis.
The lack of proper foreign community-run schooling facilities in many cities and remote areas is a major issue for the fresh influx of expatriates in such places. Often, they are forced to reject job offers or prefer to look for jobs in Jeddah, Riyadh or Dammam.
The problem is not confined only to expatriates but now it’s affecting Saudi employers both from the private sector as well as vital public sectors such as Ministries of Health and Education.
The situation is severe in Makkah and Madinah besides other cities and towns like Hafr Al-Baten in Eastern Province to Jazan in the Southern province.
Seeking permission to establish community-run foreign schools in various provinces, where sizable community lives, is a pressing subject being taken up by the highest diplomatic levels of Asian countries with local authorities in appropriate forums, according to sources.
Makkah is witnessing huge civil and commercial infrastructure development projects, with thousands of Asian expatriates moving to work in various positions. Following the slowdown in Dubai, there has been a significant rise in Asian expatriates movement to Makkah to take up new jobs. But lack of schooling facility of their own syllabus is posing real challenge to them.
Some of them prefer to be based in Jeddah and commute daily to Makkah for work, while others are relocating to other cities where they have schooling facility.
Mohammed Mazhar Ali, who moved from Dubai to Makkah, said: “Obviously, being a Muslim, I am glad to be in Makkah, but as a parent, I am saddened that there is no school.”
On Tuesday night, a large number of Indian community members from various states met to press their demand for establishment of Indian community school in the holy city.
The situation in Madinah is not very different from Makkah. There are some private schools in Yanbu but many Indian parents are demanding a community-run school.
The Custodian of Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah’s vision for knowledge society has resulted in establishment of universities in several cities across the Kingdom, where non-Arabic English-speaking expatriate are being hired by authorities in some specialized jobs to train Saudi youth.
“Yes, we are facing problem with lack of proper Pakistani school in Jazan for our children,” says Professor Farhan Osman, who works at Jazan University.
In the last few years, several universities were established where Asian teaching faculty have been hired. But they are worried about schooling for their wards and the situation is worse in towns where colleges and campuses of these universities have come up.
According to sources, many of these universities have hired IT lecturers who are young with small children for whom schooling was not a major issue, but they have not been able to attract talent in other specialized faculties like medicine and chemistry.
The situation is worse in the northern areas of the Kingdom. The Northern Border University located in Arar near Iraq is facing problems because of lack of experts in its medical facility. The university’s medicine wing has a total of 12 departments starting from dentistry to clinical laboratory but it has not been able to hire expats as most candidates are refusing jobs offered by the university due to lack of foreign community schools, according to university officials.
Dr. Mofadhi Al-Sharari, director of public relations in Northern Border University, said the university was having difficulties as many non-Arabic expatriates are reluctant to accept job offers citing lack of schools for their children, and this in turn affects the medical college’s functioning.
Some expats dissuaded from taking job postings with no foreign schools
