JEDDAH — Over 2,000 special education graduates have been waiting for three years to be hired by the Education Ministry despite passing the necessary aptitude tests. The graduates expressed their frustration with the ministry's failure to send information on vacancies for special education teachers to the Ministry of Civil Service. The graduates met with Ministry of Education Undersecretary Saad Al-Fuhaid, who promised to solve the problem and asked them to nominate a number of graduates to represent them. The problem began when the ministry started hiring diploma holders seven years ago. Back then, bachelor's degrees in special education was not a requirement for hiring teachers. Many special needs diploma holders did not find jobs due to the theoretical nature of the courses. After the bachelor's program in special education was launched, many diploma holders enrolled. During their years of study, the ministry continued to hire diploma holders. When these degree holders graduated, the ministry informed them that it had filled all available vacancies with diploma holders. Okaz/Saudi Gazette spoke with a number of graduates who gathered in front of the Ministry of Education's branch headquarters in Jeddah. A graduate, identified by his initials A.H., pointed out that there are some 500,000 disabled students in Saudi Arabia. The ministry currently caters to only 38,000 of those cases. He added that a number of public universities still offer special education diplomas. This will increase the number of diploma graduates and heighten the problem for the students with degrees, he claimed. Abdullah Al-Thaqafi, a graduate specializing in learning difficulties, said he had worked at a public school. There, every nine special needs students required 18 periods weekly, and took four to five years to educate them. Al-Thaqafi claimed that at his school, 450 special needs students are on the waiting list. He proposed that extra classes be opened to serve both the waiting list of students and the unemployed graduates.
