The Educational Challenges of Algeria
Algeria is in the process of a huge transformation. People have been patient with the old guard of ancient minds (and bodies) and their obsolete and corrupt ways for long enough. The internet and satellite television have shown them how the rest of the world (including some Arab countries) functions, and they wonder why, with all its natural and human resources, Algeria consistently ranks near the bottom of every table on any indicator, from educational performance to infrastructure and business environment. The people simply want a new “system” — a free, open, meritocratic system that will bring up the most talented among the young generation and put in place a new approach to life (freedom and transparency) and management (knowledge-based methods in all areas).
Algeria has a number of challenges to address. I will devote most of this piece to the educational arena but, before I do that, here are a few telling statistics about how bad the situation is generally.
In the 2018 “Future of Knowledge” foresight report that was released last December by the Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Knowledge Foundation, in collaboration with the UN Development Programme, Algeria ranked 104th out of 134, just ahead of Cambodia and the Kingdom of Eswatini (which, I must confess, I had never even heard of). In this report, Algeria ranked 115th in economy, 117th in general enabling environment, and 107th in information and communications technology. To compare, Tunisia, with a fraction of Algeria’s resources, ranked 75th in economy, 101st in general enabling environment, and 84th in information and communications technology — not spectacular, but much better than its bigger neighbor.
In education, and again in the same report, Algeria ranked 95th in mean years of schooling, 84th in pre-university education, 80th in higher education, 122nd in technical and vocational education and training, and 58th in research, development and innovation. While the latter field was the only bright spot for Algeria in that report, it is still an important signal, namely that there are good potentials and good efforts being made within the country, despite the bureaucracy and the stifling environment, such as the bad internet networks, academic libraries, etc.
In the crucial field of pre-university education, there are two international tests that are conducted every three years and in which many countries, including several Arab states, voluntarily participate to gauge the level of performance of their pupils, teachers and overall system: TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study), which tests fourth and eighth-grade pupils in mathematics and science, and PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), which tests 15-year-old school pupils’ scholastic performance in mathematics, science and reading. There have been some critiques and discussions of the applicability of these tests in very different educational contexts, and those in charge of the tests — which have been running for almost 20 years now — have been working to improve them, but they are widely used as indicators of the performance of pre-university educational systems.
I would like to suggest a national task force on education, to be formed as soon as the political transition is over.
Nidhal Guessoum
Algeria only participated in PISA in 2015 and has yet to put its students through TIMSS. Its score was one of the lowest: 376 in science and 360 in math, where 500 is the expected average or normal attainment. Arab countries scored between 437-427 (UAE, science-math) and 386-367 (Tunisia, science-math). Jordan, which scored 409 and 380 (science and math), considered its results a crisis and conducted a year-long review, overhauling its system and vowing to do much better next time, i.e., in the 2018 tests, which have now been conducted and the results are expected soon. What was Algeria’s reaction? The minister of education (who was replaced a few weeks ago after five years in office) simply decided to withdraw Algeria from PISA.
Algeria has a huge task ahead in the field of education. “Reform” is a recurrent idea in education — almost everywhere in the world. Much has been written about the successful countries of the Far East and Scandinavia, and much can be learned from them. But there are some fundamentals of “educational reform” that need to be considered, some of which will be found to be most applicable to the situation at hand. These include the number of hours of schooling, class sizes, teacher skills (likely requiring retraining to comply with new pedagogies and resources), new instructional materials (taking the digital revolution into account), and new examination procedures (recalling recent national examination cheating and leakage scandals).
I would like to suggest a national task force on education, to be formed as soon as the political transition is over and a new, widely accepted government is in place. The task force should include Algerian experts plus a few foreign ones — we do have much to learn from others. Moreover, the Algerian experts should include a few expats, who will participate pro bono. Indeed, Algeria must find quick ways to benefit from its expatriated citizens and, with free video communication and easy travel nowadays, forming international task forces and commissions should be the norm from now on.
As I’ve said, Algeria has a number of serious challenges to address and fields to plow, due to years or rather decades of mismanagement and corruption. I hope it seizes this moment in its history to launch serious and strong development programs. Algerians everywhere are ready to take up the challenge.
- Nidhal Guessoum is an Algerian professor at the American University of Sharjah, UAE. Twitter: @NidhalGuessoum
