RIYADH, 1 December 2007 — The Ministry of Education has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the British Council as part of its initiative to upgrade English-language courses, redesign textbooks and set up training programs for English language supervisors.
John Gore, deputy director of British Council for Saudi Arabia, told Arab News that the ministry’s efforts to improve English teaching in government schools was in line with Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah’s call to bring about a qualitative change in the country’s educational system to prepare the youth for the challenges of the 21st century.
Gore was speaking to Arab News during a get-together recently for Saudi alumni of British universities. Earlier, British Ambassador William Patey spoke about Saudi-British relations, while the Saudi alumni underlined the need for enriching the curricular content and increasing the intake of Saudi students to the UK. They also referred to the double standard followed in Britain vis-à-vis Saudi students.
Gore said a team of consultants from the British Council would work closely with the ministry in reviewing the contents of the Saudi English textbooks. The Council will also set up a “cascade training” program under which British experts will train Saudi English language supervisors (both men and women), so that they could in turn pass on the benefit of the training program to some 30,000 English-language teachers working in government schools.
Gore said they have signed a MOU with the General Organization for Technical Education and Vocational Training for designing English-language courses for students of technical institutes. The whole idea behind the scheme is to prepare these graduates for the requirements of the job market, he said. Some 200,000 young Saudis enter the job market every year.
“We are also working on a twinning program, whereby Saudi and British institutes will exchange ideas, teachers and curricular methods for making vocational education more useful for the prospective employers,” Gore said, adding that the program would help upgrade the skills of the instructors.
In his speech, Patey said that he had noticed new dimensions in the Kingdom’s ties with Britain during the two stints that he served in Saudi Arabia, first as the deputy ambassador from 1995-1998 and now as ambassador.
“During my first term, defense and trade were the two pillars of Saudi-British relations. As our relations grew year on year, Saudi Arabia and Britain strengthened their relations on regional issues like Palestine, Iraq and Iran,” he said. “So this became the third pillar of our expanding relations.”
The ambassador said subsequently both countries have developed a shared interest in security and the fight against terrorism, which the ambassador said had became the fourth pillar of their bilateral relations.
“Now a fifth pillar has been added in the form of Saudi-British cooperation in the field of education,” he said. “Since the US is no longer the first choice for Saudi students in terms of education, I want to see a generational change in this direction.”
He welcomed the presence of 3,500 Saudi students in Britain and hoped that the number would double under King Abdullah’s Scholarship Program, which would see 500 more Saudis going to Britain for college at the end of this year.
