Thursday, January 7, 2010

Challenges to Higher Education in a Palestinian Statehood

Challenges to Higher Education in a Palestinian Statehood


 
Dr. Adnan Badran, Deputy Director-General of UNESCO, Paris



 


Conference on:
The Role of Higher Education in the Context of an Independent Palestinian State
7-9 Nov.1996


I have always had the fullest admiration of the Palestinian people who were able, despite occupation and in the absence of the experience of statehood, to build universities that are among the best in the area.

Difficulties faced by Palestinians in the Diaspora made it inevitable for them to be self-reliant. Frequent migrations have taught them to value education highly.

Those with education made it through life, and those without education had difficult times. Education in its turn brought wealth to some Palestinians working abroad. It thus became necessary to build bridges between people who are out and those who are inside and to capitalize on human resources.

Palestinians do not have natural resources to rely on, no oil, limited water resources and no land. Since education is the only capital Palestinians have, it cannot be traditional, it has to be well-tuned to the needs of the people, it should seek to alleviate poverty and move towards globalization.

The prerequisite for joining global education is quality and Palestinian higher education has to be competitive in an era of globalization.

I. Challenges to Palestinian Higher Education

Thus the role of Palestinian universities is a challenging one; universities need to "tailor education" to the needs of -the people and to raise the quality of their teaching and research to the level expected of them.

In addition to the responsibility of preparing students for employment, Palestinian universities have a national responsibility: the university is part of the national aspiration of Palestinian people and part of their value system.

Palestinian higher education has to render the following results:

  1. preservation of Palestinian cultural heritage, universities should fulfill national aspirations;

  1. Promotion of democratic, cultural and human values. They should encourage dialogue,  multilingualism, pragmatism and develop real democracy in the minds of men and women;

  1.  search for excellence through serious encouragement in competitions;

  1. develop human resources and make them really contribute to the social and economic development;

      5. Making studies and surveys to find the priority areas of human resources development services and to plan and structure programs on how we want a human being to be;


6. universities should be flexible in modifying plans, activating human resources and training people for life-long education through constant refreshing of their courses;

7. university education should be accessible to all those who are qualified on the basis of merit;
Universities should help in the modernization of education in a world of uncertainties and to a population of students which is increasing rapidly; universities should meet the challenges of globalization where competition becomes high and knowledge generated therein is the most important tool.

No comments:

Post a Comment