New Independent School in the Middle East - Essay Example

An analysis and evaluation of the development, nature and organization of a New Independent School in the Middle East BACKGROUND LITERATURE There are many common themes within the historical and cultural experiences of the various countries that exist within the region known to the rest of the world as the Middle East. Some of the more important similarities are the recognition of Islam as the primary religion of the region and the use of Arabic as the primary language. These two elements of social living play a strong role in the region’s identity, as a region and as individuals living within that region. For most of the nineteenth century and at least the first half of the twentieth century, this entire region was under the control of European colonization. When the colonial forces pulled out of the area, “a strong economic, cultural and political dependence on developed countries remained” (Wood & Pitt, 2007). As a part of the dominant culture’s changes upon the local inhabitants, the colonial authorities often enforced mandatory modern education for all children within a given age range. In the modern world, it is common for children to attend compulsory education centers beginning at approximately age 5 or 6 and continuing through the primary levels, meaning through age 11 or 12. This means that they are required to attend school when between these ages. Some countries also enforce school attendance through the lower secondary grades to age 15 or 16 although school is available to students through age 17 or 18. The enforcement of an education was not as much of a change in the Middle East as might be thought by outside interests primarily because they had already established Koranic schools. However, instead of being a means of finding common ground, “this alternative system was in competition with the colonial one not only because of its religious reference but also because of its opposition to western cultural hegemony” (Akkari, 2004). Within the Muslim society, school intended for religious enlightenment has a sharply different role than school intended for modern development of the culture. The primary role of the Koranic school is to educate children in their proper, traditional roles and to enforce upon them the beliefs of their parents and ancestors. “The Koranic school, with lessons in Arabic by a teacher of religion known as maallam, Fkih, is an essential part of the upbringing of a Muslim child” (Akkari, 2004). All children born and raised within this region are expected to be given a Koranic education, which consists primarily of recitation and memorization. In addition, many children are given the opportunity to advance to even higher religious studies. While it may seem that the influx of European interests has driven the hot debate between traditional Koranic education and more modern industrialized education, this is not the case. In some Arab countries, particularly those with more interaction outside their borders, the debate has been raging for centuries. Recognition of the need to compete has driven many of these countries to achieve compulsory primary school enrollment with increases in attendance achieved in recent years. There have also been some significant increases in total secondary school attendance. Less dramatic has been the growth in tertiary school enrollments in these areas with some countries even registering slight declines throughout the 1990s. The growing populations have meant that even a constant rate of enrollment represents a large increase in the total number of students in modern educational programs. This has also had a strong impact on bringing the level of education to a new level of modern standards. “Primary enrolment shot up from 61 per cent in 1965 to 98 percent in 1990, with particular progress in oil-exporting countries” (Akkari, 2004). The need to expand the basic education system within most Arab states was facilitated by tremendous economic growth brought about as the result of oil incomes. According to the World Bank (1995), the Middle East from 1960 to 1980 outperformed all other regions except East Asia in total income growth. As a result of these rapid changes, the social outcomes have been enormous impacting everything from quality to quantity of life. For example, infant mortality rates have been reduced to less than half while the life expectancy of the average individual has increased by more than ten years. According to the Institut National e’Etudes Statistiques (1999), average life expectancy in Tunisia was 51 years in 1961 and has risen to 72 years in 1998. The primary drivers for the Middle East in its struggle to achieve universal public education were this demographic explosion coupled with a large rural population within these three countries. According to the 1986 census, a major proportion of the Middle East population was younger than 15 years of age and within the age range of compulsory education. With a relatively young and growing population, pressures on the education system in recent years have been enormous (Zibani, 1994). One area in which access to schools and a lack of classroom space has been particularly problematic is in the mountain regions of Yemen where a significant number of people still live. During the years 1998 and 1999, as many as 2000 women were trained in Yemen as teachers intending to work in rural areas. “The Community Schools Project, which began in 1994 with approximately 1,000 girls in 120 villages, now reaches more than 11,000 girls who would not otherwise have received primary education” (Akkari, 2004). Although most communities and villages have managed to provide some form of classroom space within the local area, there are several cases in which these classes have no where else to meet except under the trees. With the efforts of UNICEF (2000), at least fifty new classrooms have been constructed and another 25 classrooms repaired for young female students so that they can study properly. Through these types of efforts, access to basic modern education for boys and girls is widening in the Middle East. In spite of this progress, demographic pressures continue to require extensive use of available facilities as well as perpetuate a number of significant issues. In most schools, double and sometimes triple shifts of students are required even as a significant deficit exists in the number of available qualified teachers. These issues necessarily limit the quality and availability of basic education to the children of these regions. This is complicated further in rural areas where school children may need to walk for hours before they can reach the nearest school. Widespread poverty and the use of children as low-wage workers are also contributing factors in low educational achievements in the Middle East. Unsurprisingly, it is the poor and the least privileged who suffer the most from the unstable situation of the educational system in the Middle East. As has been mentioned, many students are only able to attend double or triple shift schools, most forced to overcrowd the classrooms at the same time and thus limiting the instruction time students can receive. Most schools are also lacking in necessary sanitary facilities, adequate educational materials and quality teaching. As a result, these ‘modern’ school systems offer only very poor results and decrease the attractiveness of attaining an education to the student as well as the child’s parents and local authorities (Fergany, 1995a). Throughout the Middle East it is estimated that almost 2.5 million children aged 6 to 10 years were not attending school in 1995. That same year, another 2 million children aged 11-15 years dropped out of the educational system. By 2015, these numbers are expected to increase by more than 40 percent to 3.74 million and 2.8 million respectively. To meet some of the early challenges of education in the Middle East, the first private school, the American Mission School, was conceived in 1913. Now known as the AlRaja School, this institution has influenced the development of several private schools in Bahrain now seeing to the educational needs of all citizens, Arab and foreign, living within the state. Private schools have had such an influence that all children registered in nurseries and kindergartens were enrolled within the private sector in the academic year of 2005-06. In the same year, 24.7 percent of children at the primary level, 18.6 percent of students at the intermediate level and 14.1 percent of students at the secondary level were in the private sector (UNESCO, 2006). There are two major types of private schools in Bahrain. National private schools are established and run by Bahraini citizens or can sometimes operate with the participation of non-Bahrainis. These schools offer various different educational levels typically enabling a child to start at kindergarten and continue attending the same school all the way through to secondary school completion. They often offer bilingual programs, teaching all subjects in English and Arabic. In addition to these schools, foreign private schools have also been instituted, run and financed by foreign endowments, organizations or communities in Bahrain. These schools also offer students the full spectrum of classes from kindergarten through secondary levels. Although these schools were originally established to provide suitable educations for the children of foreign communities operating in Bahrain, most of them will accept Bahraini and Arab students. Subjects are taught in the language accepted by the school, which is usually English, French or Urdu, which is more commonly known as Indian. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY The present study will employ a two-fold research methodology to analyze and evaluate the development of a new educational organization in the Middle East. The first segment will be a case study of a well-established organization. This organization will have at least a 15 year history of serving students in the region and will currently have a student population of at least 4000 students. The staff and students must represent an equally culturally diverse group of different communities form all over the world. The data to be used in the study will be collected through the case study of the institution. This data will be used to compare to the original aims and objectives that were set when the particular independent institution was constituted. In addition, the study will look at changes that were compelled over a period of advancement as the result of the communal and organizational appeals for a brisk development of educational facility in response to changing needs. As the investigation advances, the alterations or metamorphosis of the organization in regards to the objectives of the institution during its development will be concluded and the reasons for and impact of these changes will also be examined. In order to examine the adaptations to the aims and objectives of the case study institution, influencing factors within the institution’s organizational structure and external influences will be considered. An internal analysis of the school concerning its students and parent body as well as the issues faced because of their cultural and religious diversity is necessary. Nevertheless, the curriculum used and the difficulty in identifying an appropriate curriculum will also be brought under consideration. The analysis of the institutional operation and structure of the school and in particular the changes to these structures and the influence upon enrollments during the advancement period of the institution will lead to the conclusion of the effectiveness of the organizational structure. This will include an indication of the financial implications and requirements for funding a developing school. An additional internal impact factor to be considered is the problems encountered when planning physical structures to accommodate an ever-growing student population. These will be scrutinized, as well as the emotional adjustments required of the students when moving from one block of buildings to another as they progress through the school system. The funding of a transport system to convey students between home and school and the accompanying problems of regularly operating such a system will also be considered. The type of security system introduced to cope with the requirements of a Middle East environment will also be discussed as well as the essential task of implementing a disciplinary code to contend with the discipline problems encountered in a school with four thousand five hundred students. Finally, a look will be taken at the administrative system required to operate a large independent school. These internal factors are necessarily impacted by complex external factors in the area. An analysis will therefore be done of the impact of religion, gender, culture, and the political situation in Bahrain as well as the key stakeholders in the school’s growth and development. The effects of these factors on the aims and objectives of the school, as well as the importance of finding a market niche, will be examined and the way in which the school has endeavored to deal with the impact of these factors will be discussed. It is intended that a close study of these factors within the case study school’s context will contribute to a broader understanding of these issues in education in the region more broadly. By investigating these factors, conclusions can be drawn as to the difficulties that teachers face in the classroom. The difficult task of uniting teachers from different cultural, religious and educational backgrounds into a united team with a common focus will be discussed, as well as the problem of fostering a cordial relationship between the teaching staff and citizen parents. Further, the nature and effectiveness of ongoing in-service training programs for teachers arriving in this environment will be mentioned and analyzed. The major adjustments required of expatriate teachers on their arrival in the Middle East will be examined. As the second fold gets in to consideration after this, a comparative study with other, similar schools in the Middle East would be employed to determine how closely the case study of the particular school exemplifies developments in other parts of the region. This study will not only be based upon the references to existing academic literature. Nevertheless, the results would also be concluded through information gained from electronic communication with other school in the form of questionnaires and general information requests. The conclusions drawn from the comparative study would be employed with in the theoretical context in order to explore whether the development patterns relevant to the existing model of educational provision. Finally, an analysis will be done of the problems that independent schools in the Middle East will need to address to ensure their popularity and existence. These will be based on the previously mentioned internal and external impact factors on the school. A forecast will be made of plans to ensure the existence and further development of NIS in a Middle Eastern context. INTRODUCTION Education is primarily an end in itself: an essential ingredient for the full realization of human capacity, within the tradition of Human Capacity Theory. In this study, an analysis of the development, nature and organization of a new independent school in the Middle East will be employed. The quality and standard of education in Middle East has always been a big question in everyone’s mind as the literacy rate in Middle East was always low as compared to other developing countries before 1960. However, the number of literate people dramatically increased during 1960 – 1995, and is still increasing day by day. Models of endogenous economic growth draw the attention towards importance of investment in knowledge, including basic education, as a critical factor in economic expansion. Specialists have long argued that education should form a principal component in any development strategy (Akkari, 2004). The Middle East constitutes a vast region stretching from the Arabian Ocean to the Arab- Persian Gulf. Each country has certain vital similarities irrespective of current and past experiences in terms of education. These similarities provide a starting point for a country-to-country comparison, and for a better understanding of some of the problems that must be solved if the educational systems are to be structurally improved. Free, publicly provided education has been a central tenant of the social contract in every country in the Middle East since independence. Post-independence governments significantly expanded their education systems, driven by rapidly expanding youth populations, the need to build nationhood and to establish political legitimacy and popular support for new regimes through making education a fundamental right of citizenship. It is well known that population growth in the Arab countries is among the highest in the world, which makes providing basic education a major challenge. However, education systems in the region, with few exceptions, now provide basic education to most children. Opportunities for secondary education, vocational training and tertiary education are also provided to many students, particularly in urban areas. In this case, study, we will focus on analysis and evaluation of the development, nature and organization of a New Independent School in the Middle East. A comparative case study of the institutions will be employed over the circumstantial case study of an existing organization which will include the factors influencing the organizational structure and operation in varying from basic structure of the institution, emotional point of view of pupils from various cultures, funding, staffing to the security and transport management of the institution. Since the beginning of education in Kingdom of Bahrain, Independent or Private education at all levels and types in Bahrain is moving along with the public education as it aims at achieving the same public school objectives. The count of private education institutions has advanced due to the economic development observed by the State and the presence of many migrants active in miscellaneous sectors. The Directorate of Private Education at the Ministry of Education is the in authority for administering the private education institutions. The Directorate is also in charge of issuing licenses to establish private education institutions when an institution fulfills all the required date and conditions as stated in the Law decree No. 14 of 1985. This law concludes the agendas, the requirements of school buildings, teaching staff, records, plans and curricula, as well as punishment and other general rules. References Akkari, Abdeljalil (2004) “Education in the Middle East and North Africa: The Current Situation and Future Challenges”, in International Education Journal, Vol.5, No.2, pp. 144-153. Fergany, N. (1995a). Strategic Issues of Education and Employment in Egypt. Cairo: Al-Mishkat Center for Research and Training. Institut national détudes statistiques. (1999). Recensement de la population et de lhabitat. Tunis: INES. World Bank (1995). Claiming the future. Choosing prosperity in the Middle East and North Africa. Washington, DC: The World Bank. Zibani, N. (1994). Le travail des enfants en Egypte et ses rapports avec la scolarisation: esquisse d’évolution. Egypte-Monde Arabe. Cairo: CEDEJ. Read More