A couple of years ago, the Office of International Relations at UJ asked the Student Affairs Administration to recommend a group of students for a program they were involved in with the University of North Carolina. There was a class given at UNC called “the Conflict over Palestine/Israel”, and the professor in charge wanted to make use of the University’s contact with UJ to have her students correspond with their peers here, and get another perspective into the issue. This was supposed to pave the way for a video conference between the two groups towards the end of that semester.
The UNC students enrolled in that class were majoring in areas like Journalism, History, International Relations, and Political Sciences. However, the students recommended by the Student Affairs Administration here were all in science majors; Dentistry, Pharmacy, and engineering (yours truly)!
We had a chance to look at the course plan and outline, and I can tell you, I was so jealous!! The amount of reading that those students were expected to do, the kind of debate and discussions and essays they were supposed to write, the work that they would be graded for (no exams), the assigned projects… the level of engagement in the subject, all made me painfully aware of the poor level of Higher Education in Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Jordan (and probably other Jordanian Universities).
If you look at any of the courses and classes in Humanities here, first of all you will most likely find one assigned textbook, usually written by the professor himself and some of his colleagues. Then, only 20% of the final grade is assigned to course work, projects, or essays… the remaining 80% is solely exam results, where students end up memorizing stuff rather than analyzing and developing their own researched and well thought-out opinions on the issue they’re studying. I don’t want to over generalize, because I know there are a few exceptions… but that’s what they are, EXCEPTIONS!
I think if there is to be any attempt at political development, or cultural development for that matter, there should be a total revolution in the education of liberal arts and social sciences in our universities. Students here complain if they’re expected to do one research, or if they’re supposed to study something that the professor didn’t mention in class. Most of us master the skills of copy/paste, not even bothering to read past the first few lines of each paragraph we’re copying. Few students know how to include a few original lines that they themselves wrote. Few professors grade students based on how well they present their opinion, how well they anticipate the questions that would be posed by someone with an opposing opinion and tackle them, and to what extent their presented paper follows recognized standards, in citation, organization, and presentation.
One of the elective classes I took as part of the University requirements was Social Psychology. Although the subject was very interesting, the class itself was extremely boring, nothing more than taking notes of what the professor was saying because that was what he would ask us about in the exam!!
Naturally the issue of higher education is not a closed cycle, and we need to look at the earlier stages of education. When I remember my tawjihi exams, and how it was all based on properly stating the information presented in the one book we studied… I can’t help but feel sad!! Yes sad… because schools need to be a place where we learn skills, and those skills should include, above all, how to think for ourselves. Computers are great, ICT opens wonderful learning opportunities… but more important than all of that, is to teach students good analytical and critical thinking. There’s a lot of emphasis on changing the math and science school curricula into something more interactive and dynamic. But what about history, literature, civil education??!!
There’s so much to be said about the issue of education, but sometimes you find yourself trapped in a vicious circle… changing the curricula doesn’t solve the problem, because it’s all about how the teachers present it, and it’s all about the entire learning culture that teachers transfer in class… so how do you change the teachers’ mentality and approach?! It all started in the environment in which these teachers grew up, and most of them reach a point where they are resistant to change… it’s much easier to instigate change in the culture of youth! When you think of it, who are the people who opt to major in Educational Sciences at Universities? Have you ever paid a visit to the Faculty of Educational Sciences at UJ?? Did you know that its minimum accepted high school grade average is the lowest compared to all other faculties and majors?
It’s a complex issue, and I hate myself when I do what most people do… talk at length about the problem without offering suggesting ideas or practical proposals for a solution. I think that sometimes when we cannot fully penetrate or change the system, then a good idea would be to create a parallel system… informal education, programs that go into schools and universities and work with young people, but not necessarily within the curricular academic framework. Some call it extra curricular activities, but I prefer to call it experiential learning, civic involvement… I believe this constitutes a wonderful step forward, but by no means does it fully substitute what a rigorous, intense, and intellectually demanding university experience can offer!
generally I get many dreams while sleeping!
I started reading this novel last August, on the plane from Amman to London. I hadn’t gotten past the third page when the person next to me – an Iraqi man in his late fifties or early sixties – asked me what I was reading, and then started a conversation; about Iraq, politics, society, his family, his children… We ended up spending the entire flight talking, well, he did most of the talking, but it was enjoyable nonetheless, and it got quite amusing when he started giving me paternal advice on how to “find the right man”… “Remember the three most important rules…” he kept saying 
