São Paulo – The Saudi king, Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, will inaugurate today (23rd) the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (Kaust), in Thuwal, a small city on the Red Sea coast, 80 kilometres north of Jeddah, the country’s foremost economic hub.
The institution has the ambitious goal of paving the way for a knowledge-based society in Saudi Arabia. According to information supplied by Agence France-Presse (AFP), this is arguably the first university dedicated solely to postgraduate programs to be created from scratch.
The masters and doctorate courses cover the fields of applied mathematics, computer sciences, biosciences, chemical engineering, earth sciences, electrical engineering, environmental engineering, materials engineering and mechanical engineering.
The actual classes, for 374 students from 60 different countries, began on the 5th of September. A total of 71 professors, also of various origins, were hired, including president Choon Fong Shih, who has directed the University of Singapore. The classes are taught in English.
According to Associated Press (AP), 817 students, 15% of which are Saudis, have enrolled so far, and for more than half of them, classes will only begin in early 2010. The number of students is expected to rise to 2,000 within eight to ten years.
Funds were not spared for the institution to be established. The cornerstone was laid in October 2007. Less than two years later, the 36-square-kilometre campus is ready and equipped with cutting-edge research tools, including the Shaheen (Pilgrim Falcon) supercomputer, considered the fastest in the Middle East and the 14th fastest in the world.
In order to make the institution into a global reference centre, the Saudis offered high wages to renowned professors and full scholarships to students. The university received a US$ 10 billion endowment for research. It has already signed several cooperation agreements with teaching institutions in other countries, as well as with multinational and local companies.
The Saudi minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Ali Al Naimi, who is also the chairman of the board at Kaust, stated that the institution is ushering in a new era of economic and scientific progress in the country. “It is also going to expand the contribution of Arabs and Muslims to civilization,” he said, according to Riyadh-based newspaper Arab News.
Following the guidance of the king, the university was established by the state-owned oil company Saudi Aramco. The chairman of the company, Khalid Al Falih, declared, according to Arab News, that Kaust is going to turn knowledge into the third driving force in the country, after petroleum and the industry.
Impact
Still according to Arab News, the Saudi academic community wants to know how the institution is going to influence other universities in the country and students in general. Many professors, according to the newspaper, believe that other schools will be forced to increase their teaching quality so that their students may pass the postgraduate courses at Kaust.
Another paradigm that the university promises to break is a cultural one. Saudi Arabia is the most conservative country in the Middle East, and is guided by a strict religious doctrine. There is, for instance, an intense segregation of men and women, who are not supposed to walk together unless they are related, in addition to a series of limitations on women’s rights, which include a prohibition on driving and the mandatory wearing of the abaya, a sort of black robe, and of a veil on the head.
According to international news agencies, such limitations will not exist within Kaust. Men and women will be able to coexist on the campus, and female students will not be forced to cover themselves and will be allowed to drive automobiles.
“We have selected the best students in the world, and we will grant them the freedom to pursue their scientific interests,” said the Kaust president Choon Fong Shih, according to AP. The AFP informs that 15% of the students are women.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
