Education: New university combats entrenched attitudes
by mahmood on 12/11/09 at 9:25 am
At Bahrain Polytechnic, a lecturer displays a controversial Ralph Lauren advertisement, in which a model’s waist appears smaller than her head and asks students how they would avoid a similar marketing debacle.
For further education in the Arab world, this is a fresh approach. Formal lectures and rote learning are the dominant teaching methods in public universities rather than the development of problem solving skills or practical knowledge.
But in the red and blue buildings of Bahrain Polytechnic, which was launched last year, teachers from New Zealand, Australia and the UK now offer pragmatic instruction in fields such as accounting, marketing and logistics for the first time.
The university, which has 900 students, and expects 2,000 next year, is a focal point of the government’s National Education Reform, which aims to equip students for the needs of the workplace, rather than allowing them to accumulate academic credentials from hours in the classroom.
“We spoke with industries, searched jobs advertised in engineering and we developed a programme that Bahrain desperately needed,’’ says John Scott, chief executive of the school.
Bahrain is an island nation of around 1m people. Up to 100,000 Bahrainis will enter the workforce in the coming decade. In spite of government efforts to reduce employment from 16 to 4 percent, jobs remain elusive.
Unemployed men have joined street protests to demand jobs from the government.
But employers complain that few Bahrainis possess the skills they require, particularly technical or language skills, even with university degrees – in spite of numerous accounting programmes, up to 90 per cent of accountants are foreigners.
As many as 20 per cent of schools and 40 per cent of vocational training institutes are failing their students, according to an October report by the country’s newly established Quality Assurance Authority for Education and Training (QAAET).
“Education must be at the beating heart of national plans for the future,” Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa, told delegates at an education conference last month. “It is in the interest of the country and the national economy to ensure a steady supply of skilled and qualified workers.”
Bahrain spends up to 11 per cent of its budget (BD4.2bn) on education. But spending on glamorous buildings and expensive programmes, sometimes costing as much as 20 per cent of the national budget, has produced unimpressive results in the Arab world, says a recent report by the UNDP.
In Bahrain and other Gulf states, oil wealth has created a culture in which nationals feel entitled to jobs, regardless of skills. While the problem in Bahrain is less acute – many Bahranis work as taxi drivers or shopkeepers – many trades such as plumbing and nursing are filled with foreign workers.
It is a mindset that Bahrain Polytechnic is trying to change. “We try to develop a culture that they are primarily responsible for their own future, not us,” says Mr Scott. “We also work with industry, which has to provide proper work environment.”
Key sectors with significant gaps include accounting, tourism and services, translation, conference organising and transport and freight logistics.
Other reforms include a teacher training programme, secondary school vocational training and the Quality Assurance Authority that periodically reviews academic standards.
Tamkeen, a BD66m fund established last year, helps fund the career development of university graduates, particularly for potential accountants.
Unlike in other Gulf states, Bahrainis make up 70 per cent of the country’s bankers, but the number of prestigious jobs does not match the demand from underskilled graduates. But with such expectations, it is hard to imagine Polytechnic students settling for a manual job.
The school, which currently runs two-year diploma courses, has had to promise to add a four-year degree to appease parents and students unimpressed with the lesser credential. School officials hope the mindset of students and employers will eventually change, but the reform process is still in its early stages.
Aside from the training, however, students see other advantages to studying at the Bahrain Polytechnic: “It is backed by the crown prince,” says Khalid al Khawaja, 19, a business student.
“I am sure they will find jobs for us.”
Source: FT.com
