We discuss the popular KASP scholarship programme, as well as the KASPTT, which focuses on the vocational sector. In addition, Dr Bal’awi shares his insights on the Arab Spring’s impact on student mobility, as well as the importance of online learning in the Middle East and North Africa. Watch our video and continue reading below.

King Abdullah Scholarship Program (KASP)

Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah Scholarship Program (KASP) will run through 2020, sources have confirmed. The Saudi government invests a hefty 9 billion SAR (approximately 1.782 billion EUR) in the programme each year, and this provides full funding for nearly 130,400 students – for bachelors, masters and doctorate programmes abroad. At present, the undergraduate fields of study are limited to medicine, medical science and health sciences; however, more options exist for graduate studies.

Dr Bal’awi discusses the criteria the Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE) sets for institutions looking to qualify to receive Saudi students, such as:

• quality of education
• professional, national accreditation
• ratio between local vs. international students
• admission requirements
• personal relationships

Dr Bal’awi highlights the importance of this last point:

“In addition to the criteria, the educational provider is recommended to come to Saudi Arabia and meet with the MOHE because this will actually enhance the process of accreditation.”

King Abdullah Scholarship Program for Technical Trainers (KASPTT)

In addition to the MOHE supervised scholarships, the Technical and Vocational Training Corporation (TVTC) administers KASPTT. This programme targets graduates from colleges of technology and higher technical institutions.

When speaking about the KASPTT conditions, Dr Bal’awi explains:

“TVTC gives non-engineering students two years to complete their bachelors degree: it’s a 2+2 programme. However, engineering students are given 2.5 years to complete their bachelors degree, so it’s a 2+2.5 year programme.”

The fields of study/training are:

• Mechanics
• Electrical Technology
• Computer Technology
• Civil and Architectural Technology
• Chemical Technology
• Environmental Technology
• Management Technology
• Food Technology
• Travel & Tourism Technology
• Ornaments/Jewellery design and manufacture

Destinations and student mobility

In terms of destinations for Saudi students, the reasons behind the students’ preferences for the US, Canada, the UK and Australia include:

• Academic excellence
• Variety of educational opportunities
• Cutting-edge technology
• Security
• Campus life experience
• Strong ties with Saudi Arabia

The spread of destinations is illustrated below:

Dr Bal’awi also discusses the Arab Spring’s impact on student mobility, leading many young people to study and work abroad in more stable countries. The map below illustrates the power behind recent pro-democracy movements in the Middle East and North Africa.

For more information on the US $65 billion Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) education sector, please see our article “Key growth drivers behind increasing enrolment in Gulf states.”

Online learning opportunities

Finally, when speaking about the rise of online learning, Dr Bal’awi enthuses, “the ease and convenience online learning offers… is pushing governments to accredit online learning education,” citing examples from Saudi Arabia and Jordan. He concludes:

“I recommend all universities to also promote their online courses in the Middle East and North Africa region.”

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This was the message shared at one of the dozens of educational seminars held at last month’s EAIE Conference in Dublin, Ireland. Each year, more than 4,200 higher education professionals from over 80 countries gather for The European Association for International Education’s main event. Amongst the many sessions on offer, ICEF Monitor had the chance to attend one entitled “Social media in disrupted markets,” which shared tips and lessons learned when using social media for marketing, communications and public relations in disrupted or difficult markets.

In this context, a “disrupted market” is one where something prevents the normal use of global social media platforms. That might be a particularly acute disruption, such as a natural disaster or political or economic crisis, or it could be a more persistent condition, such as censorship or comparable government policy, in a particular national market.

China as a disrupted market

With 513.1 million Internet users in China, this is clearly a market that many international student recruiters want to tap into. But as we know, China also features several barriers to the free flow of information online, most notably the framework of restrictive policy and technology that is often colloquially referred to as The Great Firewall of China. The Chinese effort to control online communications employs both technology and manpower on a vast scale. For example, the Sina Weibo platform, a microblogging service with more than 120 million registered users, reportedly has 700 dedicated censors and keyword blocking tactics in place.

Don O’Neill of Waterford Institute of Technology in Ireland explained that these issues are not unique to China. Known as the ‘SICK’ nations (Syria, Iran, China, North Korea), the practice of blocking content is widespread. Even Germany, Pakistan and Thailand have been known to block YouTube at times as well. This illustrates that specific domains can be blocked in such systems, including potentially those of individual institutions or other providers.

Why are so many countries enforcing such restrictions? The power of social mobilisation is the real fear, not negative comments about the government. As a statement from King, Pan and Roberts in the June 2012 issue of Harvard Institute for Qualitative Social Science points out:

“Contrary to previous understandings, posts with negative, even vitriolic, criticism of the state, its leaders, and its policies are not more likely to be censored. Instead, the censorship programme is aimed at curtailing collective action by silencing comments that represent, reinforce, or spur social mobilisation, regardless of content.”

O’Neill found that, based on a survey of Chinese students who had been in Ireland for at least one year, two-thirds of them spend ten hours or less on social media each week. The main reason they use it is to stay connected with family and friends, but social media use is increasing. Recruiters should understand that most Chinese students still prefer face-to-face over virtual interaction because they won’t always believe what they see online.

According to O’Neill, “the Great Firewall is not going to disappear in the short term.” Therefore, in such environments, where global platforms may be routinely filtered or blocked, one solution is often to rely more on national platforms, which, while still subject to monitoring or censorship, would be less likely to be disabled outright.

O’Neill notes the best social networks in China to start with include QQ (with 40.3 million users) and RenRen (a Facebook equivalent with approximately 100 million regular users). Those interested in video should experiment with YouKu, the equivalent of YouTube (it merged with Tudou in Match 2012). Above all, he suggests having a native Mandarin speaker to manage your social media presence in China.

Sudden disruptions in the US

While many may associate developing nations with the words “disruptive markets”, Dr Jeffery T. Johnson, Dean of Students at Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA reminded the audience that an unsettled market can happen anywhere. He stressed, “it can, will, and does happen” when referring to possible catastrophes such as fire, earthquakes, floods, terrorism, hurricanes, tsunami, outbreaks, and protests.

Being based in the southeast of the US, Dr Johnson is well experienced in such disasters. Year after year, just as university classes were beginning for the autumn term, several intense storms hit the coast of Louisiana in late August or early September (Hurricanes Katrina in 2005, Rita in 2005, Gustav in 2008, and Isaac in 2012).

Suffice it to say that in the Katrina aftermath, Tulane was faced with a disruptive situation. They had three immediate priorities: decide when the university would reopen, keep people on the payroll, and reach out to higher education associations to see who could take displaced students.

Dr Johnson attributes their quick rebound to the administration’s preparation and the communications plan they had in place. Having multiple copies of alternate staff email addresses and phone numbers on hand is essential, so that you can reach people as quickly as possible. Furthermore, the infographic below outlines how colleges should approach social media as a crisis management tool. And Dr Johnson reminds us, “The Internet can go down, but the uniting power of texting remains strong.”

Sometimes, there is even a silver lining – such disasters can transform universities. For example, after Hurricane Katrina, Tulane University went through a massive renewal plan that strengthened the institution in the long run, and there was a marked increase in service learning activities and volunteering opportunities.

But once the situation is resolved, it’s important for schools to conquer the dilemma of how to market to prospective students in the wake of a disrupted market.

When recruiting students to a destination that could be potentially disruptive, Dr Johnson advises, “be honest with families and prospects about the risks.”

The power of social media during disrupted times

At the end of the day, the community-enabling influence of social media is well-established and widely documented across a wide range of social and political contexts around the world. For example, the Occupy Wall Street protests spread to 950 cities in 82 countries, thanks to the power of social media during this time. And protests considered to be inspired by the Arab Spring have taken place on every inhabited continent, with varying degrees of success and prominence.

The Arab Spring protests particularly illustrate the effective use of social media to organise, communicate, and raise awareness in the face of state attempts at repression and Internet censorship (see graph below). As such, they demonstrate as well the increasingly broad reach and importance of major global platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.

Source: EAIE 2012

Finally, we close with an infographic below that outlines how colleges should approach social media as a crisis management tool. It states that just 85% of colleges have crisis communication policies, and of those, only 59% address social media.

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WES uses data on credential evaluation requests to predict applications for programmes in US institutions. When its analysts compared prospective international student volumes in Q1’2011 and Q1’2012, they discovered significant increases for Bahrain (180%), Egypt (41%), Jordan (73%), and Syria (90%).

The data can only be applied to the US, yet given the US’s position as a leading and indicative study abroad market, it is reasonable to expect that other study abroad destinations will see more Arab students apply for their study programmes as well.

WES thinks it is possible that the unrest fuelled by pro-democracy movements (aka the Arab Spring) may be contributing to the outward mobility trend:

“With government overthrow and protests in Egypt, intense violence in Syria, and ongoing protests in Bahrain and Jordan, these four countries continue to experience varying degrees of sociopolitical uncertainty and instability, which may be spurring students to look abroad for study and work opportunities. Bleak employment prospects and higher-education capacity constraints may also be contributing to the push factors driving outward student mobility.”

There is also a more positive factor spurring the surge in the number of Saudi Arabian students going to the US to study: the King Abdullah Scholarship Program (KASP), into which the Saudi government invests fully 9 billion SAR (approximately 1.782 billion EUR) each year, providing full funding for 125,000 students for both undergraduate and graduate programmes abroad. WES notes the following of Saudi student trends in the US over the past five years:

“Total WES credential evaluations for Saudi applicants grew 394% between June 2007 and June 2011, with yearly increase of 59% (08/09), 88% (09/10), and 66% (10/11). The 88% spike in 2009-10 WES applications was mirrored a year later by the surge in overall enrollments shown in the 2010-11 IIE Open Doors data. In academic year 2010-11, enrollments at U.S. institutions of higher education grew 44% versus a three-year average of 26% growth between 2007 and 2010.”

The organisation also provided some details about the type of Saudi students who are coming to US institutions:

• Two-thirds (66%) of Saudi applicants for WES evaluations have already completed a bachelor degree.
• However, most are not applying for master’s level courses (20%) – most are studying at the undergraduate level (48%) or ESL/other (30%).
• The main study backgrounds of Saudi students are Health Sciences (21%), Business Marketing & Finance (20%). and Computer Sciences (14%).
• The top three fields of study among Saudi students in US higher education institutions in 2010/11 were: Intensive English, Engineering, and Business and Management.
• Demographically, men made up 70% of Saudi applicants in 2011, but women had grown from 25% of the applicant pool in 2008 to 30% in 2011. Half (50%) of Saudi applicants were between the ages of 25 and 28.

WES predicts continued growth when it comes to Saudi students in US higher education institutions for coming years along the lines of the 26% seen between 2007 and 2010; not surprising given the Saudi government’s continued investment in KASP.

Sources: World Education Services

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Goddard projects the world’s population of higher education students will more than double to 262 million by the year 2025. He expects that the bulk of this growth – more than half from China and India alone – will be in the developing world.

Even more significantly for international recruiters, Goddard forecasts that developing nations will be unable to offer sufficient higher education spaces to keep pace with this demand. As a result, the world’s population of international students will grow to eight million by 2025 – that is, nearly triple the number of students enrolled outside of their home countries today.

Further, and as has been widely observed in recent months, the field of countries competing to recruit international students will also continue to expand (see “A more complex marketplace taking shape for 2012” for our synopsis).

A University World News commentary on Making a Difference sums up the situation as follows.

The English-speaking countries have been long accustomed to dominating the market in selling international education to students but that situation is undergoing rapid change, Goddard notes.

Traditional source countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and the Middle East are developing their own capacities to offer education to outsiders. Singapore hopes to attract 150,000 foreign students by 2015, Malaysia 100,000 by 2020 and Jordan 100,000 by the same year.

China, despite facing huge demand for higher education from its own young people, is planning to expand its enrolments of foreigners from 200,000 at present to 300,000 by 2020.

Then there are developed countries such as Japan that have shown little interest in the past in marketing education overseas. With an ageing population and an increasingly under-utilised higher education sector, Goddard says there is a growing realisation among the Japanese that this could provide opportunities for ‘substantial levels of international recruitment’.

Making a Difference is available for order from the International Education Association of Australia.

Source: Making a Difference: Australian International Education, Dorothy David and Bruce Mackintosh, ed., UNSW Press, 2012; University World News

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