Student activists slam failure to monitor colleges
http://archive.gulfnews.com/region/Bahrain/10094187.html
01/03/2007 11:06 PM | By Habib Toumi, Bureau Chief
Manama: Student activists have criticised the newly-formed higher education board for its “failure to live up to the expectations of young people”.
The board was set up four months ago to look after and supervise higher education in Bahrain following the increase in the number of private universities.
Young activists yesterday charged that the board had failed in its mission by holding only two meetings since its establishment and by issuing instructions that were below their expectations.
Student activists slam failure to monitor colleges
http://archive.gulfnews.com/region/Bahrain/10094187.html
01/03/2007 11:06 PM | By Habib Toumi, Bureau Chief
Manama: Student activists have criticised the newly-formed higher education board for its “failure to live up to the expectations of young people”.
The board was set up four months ago to look after and supervise higher education in Bahrain following the increase in the number of private universities.
Young activists yesterday charged that the board had failed in its mission by holding only two meetings since its establishment and by issuing instructions that were below their expectations.
“In its first meeting, the board said that all private colleges had to set up research and study centres while in the second meeting it requested them to teach Bahrain’s modern history,” said a press statement from the Bahrain Youth Centre and the Youth Society for Human Rights.
“How could the board talk about setting up research institutions in private colleges when research studies are regressing? The board needs to reassess its priorities,” the statement said.
The cancellation of summer programmes, the high fees that students have to pay to join private colleges and the low standard of education at some of the institutions are some of the issues that the board should have addressed, according to the activists.
Private colleges have mushroomed in Bahrain since 2001 when parents, worried about negative developments targeting Arab and Muslim students following the September 11 attacks, started looking for learning destinations other than the United States.
Several educators and investors teamed up to set up colleges in the kingdom while foreign colleges opened branches in Bahrain.
The overcrowding of the country’s only public university also contributed to large numbers of Bahrainis and Gulf nationals enrolling at the private higher institutions.
But several educators have repeatedly warned about the quality of some of the new colleges and urged stricter supervision from the Ministry of Education.
The authorities responded by establishing the board to oversee them.
“We had high hopes that the board would appreciate the concerns and ambitions of the Bahraini youths but we can now see that it has other priorities that do not correspond to the aspirations of the students,” the statement said.
