Muhammad Suleiman Al-Ankari
The state’s general budget was announced last week, and the education sector continued its position with the highest expenditure of the budget allocated to 185 billion riyals at 19 percent. It is a huge sector that includes public, higher, vocational and technical education and employs more than 60 percent of the total civilian public sector workforce.
Certainly, this huge allocation has several goals which are in line with the Education Development Program and ultimately the Human Capacity Development Program, in which education is an essential pillar. Today, international competition with human capital has become the main criterion for measuring people’s progress. and development. Tens of billions of dollars, especially in the world of knowledge and digital economy and modern technology that have penetrated all economic sectors.
According to what was allocated to the education sector in the budget, and his statements to the media, Education Minister Dr Hamad Al-Sheikh said there is a gap between education output and labor market requirements and work. The demand in the labor market is increasingly being done to harmonize the programs offered in universities, indicating that education is on the verge of great development and it needs to develop human cadres and institutions, and Curriculum at universities is changing. It takes time to achieve alignment with the requirements of the labor market, and the aim of the change is to develop students’ skills and abilities to prepare them for the labor market, not just to enter university. For, that is, what can be understood from the Minister for the statement of education that development will start with education and not only with universities. Certainly, this development plan cannot be implemented without the cooperation of all, especially the family, as the development of the Ministry of Education is based on participatory relationships between educational institutions. Cadre, family and students. The interest is for all and it has common benefit.
It can be said that with respect to non-operational education allocation, i.e. spending on development and investment, the focus will be on everything that contributes to bridging the gap between production and the labor market. Scientific, medical and engineering disciplines , and the legalization of theoretical and literary subjects, in addition to an important indication that there would be a tendency to establish colleges applicable to all universities linked to the labor market. It will deal with increasing the acceptance rate for applied professional and technical expertise. To meet the need for replacement of the number of technicians and technicians required by the labor market from citizens as well as new investments coming in the industrial sector in general, maintenance and operation, to increase the percentage of localization of these jobs occupants is too big.
The world is rapidly moving towards the use of modern technology, artificial intelligence, metavirs, robots and modern technologies, which have become an essential part of the skills required for any scientific, medical, engineering and technical expertise. His old classical structures are no longer a sufficient standard to qualify for modern work. The skill must be acquired and it can be caught as one of the new trends in the education sector in the Kingdom. The global competition for Saudi human capital, which has been targeted, essentially means acquiring modern technical skills within disciplines accepted by male and female students. And have modern specializations that guarantee you a promising future in the labor market and entrepreneurship.
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