Sunday 7 February 2016

Expert enumerates reasons behind low-quality public education

AL-UQAIR: The low-quality of education in the Kingdom arises from many factors. Included among these are the complexity of the system itself, unclear educational vision, non-professional education development programs, and instability due to changing the minister.
An official added that these were in addition to the lack of continuity from previous development programs, and low qualifications of many teachers.
Saleh Al-Shamrani of the Public Education Evaluation Commission (PEEC) said: “The quality of public education in any country is based on a number of factors, such as the educational policy, teachers, curriculum, and the learning environment. In the Kingdom, we need to work on all these as well as others concerning the involvement of family and community in order to develop education and raise its quality.” 
He said that priorities should be set in order to raise the quality of public education and improve its output. 
He explained that the most important priorities include clearly identifying the main vision and purpose of the public education stages, focusing on teacher’s preparation and development to improve educational performance, as well as providing a suitable psychological and healthy learning environment.
Al-Shamrani said the teacher was the main factor contributing to economic development directly and indirectly, as the process of stimulating creative minds and successful production will effectively contribute to the economic and social development of the country and this all begins in schools. 
The PEEC official said that there was a requirement for a national framework that sets curriculum standards and reflects the vision of the leadership and the people. If this becomes reality, Saudi students will be led to acquire the required skills that will enable them to compete locally and globally.
Those priorities require continuous evaluation after applying these developmental reforms to benefit from results and apply recommendations, Al-Shamrani said. He stressed that constant evaluation of the education system has been adopted by all developed countries.

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