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An Assessment of Higher Education Needs in the West Bank and Gaza United States Agency for International Development An Assessment of Higher Education Needs in the West Bank and Gaza Submitted by The Academy for Educational Development Higher Education Support Initiative Strategic Technical Assistance for Results with Training (START) Prepared by Maher Hashweh Mazen Hashweh Sue Berryman September 2003 An Assessment of Higher Education Needs in the West Bank and Gaza Acknowledgments We would like first to extend our greatest gratitude to the Ministry of Education and Higher Education for all the support it gave in the development of this assessment. Special thanks go to Mr. Hisham Kuhail, Assistant Deputy Minister for Higher Education; Dr. Khalil Nakhleh, Head of Commission on Quality Assurance and Accreditation; Dr. Fahoum Shalabi, Director General for Development and Scientific Research/MOHE; and Ms. Frosse Dabiet, Director of International Relations / HE Sector. This work would not have been possible without the cooperation and efforts of the Deans of the Community Colleges and the Universities' Vice-Presidents for Academic Affairs. The Academy for Educational Development (AED) did everything in its capacity to facilitate our work. Special thanks are due here to Elaine Strite, Chief of Party, and Jamileh Abed, Academic Counselor. The important feedback and support of Sue Berryman / World Bank allowed us to better develop the structure, conclusions, and recommendations for this report. Finally, our appreciation and gratitude go to USAID for sponsoring this work. Special thanks go to Ms. Evelyn Levinson, former Higher Education and Training Specialist and Mr. Robert Davidson, Higher Education Team Leader, for their continuous support. Maher Hashweh and Mazen Hashweh Notice The views presented herein are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as reflecting those of the Agency for International Development or the Academy for Educational Development. Permission is granted for all non-profit use and publication of this report citing USAID. An Assessment of Higher Education Needs in the West Bank and Gaza i Executive Summary The aim of this study was to conduct a needs assessment of higher education in the West Bank and Gaza for USAID/West Bank and Gaza, under the Strategic Technical Assistance for Results with Training (START) contract. The consultants, after a preliminary review of recent studies of Higher Education in the West Bank and Gaza, identified the main challenges to Palestinian Higher Education, and used these challenges as a framework for the present investigation. It was decided to study the following aspects of higher education: Access and Capacity, Equity, Quality, Relevance and Governance. The study was conducted in three phases. In phase one, we identified and reviewed the relevant literature. In phase two we collected and analyzed available statistics, mainly from the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Higher Education (MOHE), and the Palestinian Bureau of Statistics (PBS). In phase three we designed research instruments, mainly a questionnaire to study the needs of the MOHE and another questionnaire to study the needs of the HE institutions. We supplemented the data from the questionnaires with interviews of selected officials in the Ministry of Higher Education and in a few higher education (HE) institutions. The following presents the main conclusions of the study. 1. Access and Capacity The Palestinian territories have witnessed an increasing demand for higher education, and for university education, in particular. This demand is expected to continue in the future. Universities, and some colleges, have responded well to this demand, mainly by opening new programs of study. However, the lesser demand for college education, and the competition from universities, especially Al-Quds Open University, have brought about a situation where a smaller percentage of tertiary students study in colleges. While the gross enrollment ratio for university education is still low compared to some neighboring countries, the gross enrollment ratio for college education is extremely low. In general, there is a need for more diversification, in term of type and quality of education at the tertiary level, and at the school level as well. [For a description of the differences between colleges and universities, see Chapter 1, Introduction, Section 1.2]. HE institutions face two obstacles in responding to the demand for higher education: they need to invest in upgrading and expanding their faculties and their facilities. The funding for this development is limited, given the low student fees and the limited abilities of these institutions to generate income. As will be shown later in this report, there are some indications that institutions that have expanded in response to this demand might have done so at the expense of the quality of education that they offer. An Assessment of Higher Education Needs in the West Bank and Gaza ii 2. Equity There are equity problems in HE in the West Bank and Gaza related to socio- economic status, gender, and region of residence. Poorer students are less likely to get tertiary education, and females are less likely to go to universities or to major in law, social sciences, or scientific fields. However, the gender inequity problem is not serious in comparison with other countries. Students living in some areas of the West Bank or Gaza are less likely to enroll in college or university, but this also depends on the sex of the student. Females in one region might be more underrepresented than males, but the situation could be reversed in another region. While many HE institutions gave scholarships or loans to needy students, few had proactive strategies to attract students from low SES, to attract females in certain fields, or to attract students from certain regions. 3. Quality Previous studies, based on the examination of some quality inputs, such as student/teacher ratio, have concluded that the quality of HE in the West Bank and Gaza has declined. We constructed what we thought were other indices, such as journal/teacher ratio, percentages of teachers holding specific degrees. We tried to take a preliminary glimpse at research activity by examining trends in faculty promotions. It has to be noted that we looked only at some input indices of quality, such as student/teacher ratio, and neglected other input variables, such as teacher quality, a factor that the literature shows to be an important variable affecting quality. Nonetheless, the trends in different indices we used converged, indicating a deterioration in the quality of university education. The findings are to be considered exploratory and in need of further more detailed examination. There is a need to look more carefully at quality in future studies. The unit of analysis should be the program or the department. Teacher quality can be examined by analyzing the institutions where the faculty received their training, the quantity and quality of their publications, and other professional activities. Teaching can be examined by scrutinizing course outlines, references, activities, assessment, and student evaluations. Facilities and access to books, journals, laboratories and work experiences can be also examined. Finally, outcome measures of quality can be used. These might include tracer studies, employer satisfaction, measures of learning, rates of acceptance to foreign universities for advanced studies. Our limited investigation has revealed that quality seems to be declining in most universities, and that university administrators are aware of this decline. The student/teacher ratio is increasing, the percentage of part-time teachers is increasing, and faculty are moonlighting or taking overloads. Although the situation is improving, only about half of the faculty hold doctorate degrees. The books/student and journal/teacher ratios are decreasing. Research activity An Assessment of Higher Education Needs in the West Bank and Gaza iii seems to be meager. Nonetheless, there are marked differences between institutions on all of these indices. On the other hand, the situation in colleges seems to be improving. There is a slight increase of full-time faculty members, a decrease in the student/teacher ratio and an increase in the books/student ratio. The student/teacher ratio is quite low, even by developing countries standards. This corroborates the findings of Chapter 2 of this report that this sector has more capacity to grow compared to the university education sector. Nevertheless, we also find a high variance on all of these indices among different colleges. The variance on these indices and the fact that none of the institutions we examined had an institutionalized systematic program evaluation and development procedures, reveal a need for monitoring and improving academic quality. We agree with the administrators of these institutions that, in addition to monitoring and improving quality, the institutions need to develop their faculty, and to facilitate access to educational resources. Developing income, again, appears to be the means to achieving these goals. In this Chapter, and in Chapter 2, we found that increasing financial resources is needed to provide access to quality higher education. The biggest dilemma facing Palestinian HE is providing quality and relevant education, given the severe constraints on financial resources. 4. Relevance How relevant is the Palestinian Higher Education System? In other words, how well does the higher education system support economic growth
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