Education can be somewhat insular. A university campus is a community…a small city. For many students (if my experience can be generalized), understanding the local university environment is a big enough challenge in itself. It’s unrealistic to expect most members of society to be aware of the complexities of higher education in other provinces/states or even other countries. Education is rapidly globalizing. Local views need to give way to international perspectives. For example, consider the new $12 billion Saudi Arabian KAUST. Those who proclaim universities have a limited future need to redirect their focus to the enormous funds directed to universities and how national pride (and future identity) are reflected in “world class” universities.
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One Comment
I saw your presentation World Without Course earlier this year, and now it doesn’t seem to be available anymore…then I came across this post while searching for it. I’m currently an American K-12 teacher working in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The wife and I actually interviewed with KAUST once and got a breakdown of the current academic trend in the Gulf. Similar to what Texas A&M initiated in Qatar, I believe, KAUST has been set up as a high-level research facility to attract academics. It’s easy for educators to overlook the institutional backing that goes into scientific research and development. I’ve always viewed college courses as relatively residual and celebratory of these larger initiatives, fundraisers, so to speak. Your WWC presentation touched on the subject of academic integrity and validity and this discussion is well and good for general studies. But the KAUST example doesn’t highlight a celebration of learning and academic growth as much as it does the financial and industrial core of human development. It’s survival, and people will pay dearly for rigorous solutions. I believe that any change in such would simply be a derivative of a much larger change in society.
These academic efforts in the Gulf are a reaction to a variety of diminishing resources in the region.
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