Much has been made of recent increased funding of higher education across the Kingdom. The most notable riyal recipient is the acclaimed spanking new KAUST campus, an architectural and high-tech marvel attracting myriad local and international students to quality instruction in co-ed lecture halls and labs. Global glory, laud and honor continue to be lavished upon King Abdullah for his remarkable achievements, and admonishments for advancement toward world-class accreditation of this crucial, primarily public, sector. Quite frankly, it is meet and right so to do – as in all of the above: fund, reform, achieve, laud. Are media's songs of praise truly warranted? Yes! Yet, higher education is witnessing the sudden proliferation of Preparatory Year Programs. Institutionalized as “pre-freshman” semesters, these serve to augment select high school curricula to assess whether students have the motivation, the abilities, to survive academic rigors inherent in longer term undergraduate endeavors. An internationally popular website for foreign teachers of English language reveals the extent to which corruption embraces aspects of these programs within many universities Kingdom-wide, some quite prominent. The ESL website provides anecdotal evidence of foreign teachers unwittingly, knowingly, willingly, enthusiastically implicated in contract and visa scams. Recruitment agents and campuses are named. These agents, many in collusion with outsourced overseas headhunters, offer illegal contracts and a variety of visas that prohibit salaried employment in KSA. I refer to 3-month business visit visas, tourist visas, and even visas specifying sponsorship of blue-collar workers. These same recruitment and English-course suppliers appoint on-site supervisors inexperienced in human resources, curriculum implementation, and assessment. Academic fraud abounds. Aspirants, and successful candidates, with evident glee brazenly mock Labor laws and Interior's Iqama regulations, thus lending credence to their sponsors' nefarious machinations to urgently fulfill contractual obligations signed by university administrators. Evidence on the website points to teachers applying under false pretenses: transcripts, health checks, and criminal records. This despite advice from “seasoned KSAers” to proceed with extreme caution or, better, cease interest and apply elsewhere. Intermingled with concerns related to women's safety, health insurance, accommodation quality, security, cultural norms, curriculum implementation, and dysfunctional personnel management styles, there are also inquiries regarding how best to “escape”, the availability of alcohol and drugs, and accessibility to sex, both hetero and otherwise. Then there's the weekend escapades to Manama's hotspots. How to avoid re-entry illegal-visa detection? Saudi Arabia's higher education sector currently enjoys an abundance of recruitment agents well attuned to opportunism's whisper. Many are accustomed to managing blue-collar personnel; the results are predictable. Others express intentions to construct private on-campus colleges with their name prominently displayed at Gate 1. A 24-page corruption report commissioned by, and submitted to, relevant authorities 18 months ago concludes: It would serve the best interests of[students] if recruitment and management of foreign teachers, and curriculum selection and implementation, were the direct, singular, responsibility of competent [university administration] personnel. Recent experience demonstrates that middlemen are using nefarious means by which to secure teachers and maintain their residency, and additionally implement curricula sometimes inappropriate to the academic needs and cultural proclivities of the students. Recent reports in the media indicate that KSA's education sector is to receive a considerable increase in funding as an impetus to achieve world-class education…The Gulf is generally considered to be a boon opportunity, lucrative for ESL teachers seeking alternatives from their existing overseas postings. Indeed, Saudi Arabia may well experience within the next few years a considerable influx of foreign teachers presently dissatisfied with low salaries and atrocious working conditions primarily in East Asia. Teacher recruitment agents, and their consortiums with overseas institutions, will abound. I have no doubt that many will attempt, as so many already do, to circumvent regulations to their own pecuniary advantage. I trust that the Government of Saudi Arabia seeks to engage more effective proactive measures to monitor and enforce government statutory law. Advancement and accreditation? A matter of, quite simply, integrity.
