3 Million Students Begin New Academic Year Today

More than three million university students began a new academic year 2019-2020 today.

The students are back to the state-run, private universities and Al Azhar.

The Higher Council of Universities (HCU) has announced that schooling will begin in a new state-run university in Al Arish and Marsa Matrouh Governorates.

Al Arish became independent of its mother university of Suez Canal. It houses five faculties such as physical education,  desert agriculture, education.

Also, Marsa Matrouh University houses faculties such as veterinary, education and physical education.

The HCU approved of separating the two new universities after they were equipped with suitable technical capabilities.

The first semester runs for 15 weeks from September 21 through December 31.

The historical background of higher education in Egypt, the present organizational structure, as well as current challenges and constraints are described to anchor an assessment of the strategies for educational reform which are presently underway.

Higher education in Egypt witnessed uncontrolled growth throughout the decade of the 1970-1983 when several reforms were initiated. Three broad goals have been targeted: containing enrollments through new admissions policies and testing practices; improving program quality by updating curriculum and focusing on important learning outcomes; and promoting responsible fiscal management by developing management information systems, training administrators in their use, and exploring cost recovery from various sources.

The overall literacy rate in Egypt is 72 percent as of 2010, being 80.3% for males and 63.5% for females. There is special attention given by the government and other NGOs to reduce gender disparity in education and to achieve the 2015 Millennium Development Goal of universal primary education.

But there has not been a similar increase in spending on improving the higher education system in terms of introduction of new programs and technologies. Both at the national level (inspection systems, examinations) and at local level (school level student assessments) measures of the success of education strategies and the performance of the system are weak.

The inspectorate system does not provide either solid technical support to school staff nor an effective monitoring mechanism for failing schools.