By Dr. Muhammad Yehya Al-Fal
Around 14 years ago, NBC News aired a popular TV series called “Fleecing of America,” which was presented by well-known American journalist Tom Brokaw. The series crossed my mind when I was talking about the higher education and vocational training strategy that have been adopted by the Kingdom. The series was very popular and its title became a part of American mainstream vernacular because the series focused on the money the US government squandered on projects. If we compare the content of the series with that of the higher education and vocational training offered in the Kingdom, we find many similarities that should help us analyze and fix the problem.
Before talking about this issue and how it is related to the labor market, I would like to emphasize that the Kingdom’s education system deserves to be commended and admired. After all, the country was home to a large number of illiterate people seven decades ago whereas today most people are literate.
We have an efficient and advanced education system today because of the generous public spending on the education sector. From the beginning, the government, under the leadership of the late King Abdulaziz Al-Saud, allocated a large amount to develop the education sector. The late King was a man of great insight and realized the importance of education for developing and helping the Kingdom to progress. He dispatched messengers to tribes all over the Kingdom to encourage people to enroll in schools. The King even rewarded them with financial incentives.
By the 1970s, the lion’s share of the state budget went into developing the education sector. The results of these efforts can be seen today. The Kingdom has thousands of boys’ and girls’ schools and 30 universities. No one can argue against education, especially education that is in line with modern global standards such as those in advanced countries. Completing one’s high school education is a must. However, what is the situation with college education? The answer to this question depends on two important factors: one’s desire to complete undergraduate studies and the type of jobs that are in demand in the labor market.
If we decided to conduct a documented and systematic study of students currently enrolled in undergraduate programs to find out whether they enrolled because this was what they really wanted to do, we would find that most of them entered college because their families insisted that they do so. Those students decided to go to college because they wanted to be socially accepted. We have an increasing number of students who join colleges because education is free.
Because of free education, they assume that the government will find them jobs in the public sector. There is a lot of pressure on the labor market because of the increasing number of college graduates. It is impossible for governments all over the world to employ so many graduates, let alone find jobs for them, regardless of the resources at their disposal.
Many countries have faced the problem we are facing today, which is the relationship between the labor market and the number of college graduates. These countries solved the problem by charging students for college education. In other words, the free education system was abolished. By doing this, they achieved two things: Firstly, only those who are interested in completing their education enroll in college and pay tuition fees; secondly, college students work hard to maximize their opportunities to find jobs on graduation. By acquiring new skills, students find jobs and no longer rely on the government to find jobs for them.
Vocational and technical education institutions in the Kingdom experience the same problems that colleges experience. Funds are being squandered on vocational and technical education. The government has spent billions of riyals on the sector over the past five decades and has even established the Technical and Vocational Training Corporation. This corporation runs dozens of industrial and commercial secondary schools and over 80 technical and vocational colleges. There are over 200,000 students who study in these schools and colleges. Despite this generous spending, we have so far not seen any real practical results.
The future of this sector needs to be reconsidered and the entire sector needs to be restructured. We cannot afford to stand still and take no action to resolve this issue. College education needs to be reassessed and reevaluated otherwise the squandering of money on these two sectors will never stop. Over the next few years, the number of graduates searching for job opportunities will increase, making the current situation even worse.
The only solution is to form two committees: one should consist of Saudi university staff and be tasked with the mission of developing college education. The second committee should focus on studying the future of technical and vocational training. We also need to change the strategies for higher and vocational education and align them with Saudi Vision 2030 for a brighter future.
