Islamists, stakeholders to discuss ‘curriculum crisis’ in Kingdom

AMMAN — The Islamic Action Front (IAF) and other stakeholders will start a conference on Saturday to brainstorm solutions for what they described as “Jordan’s curriculum crisis”.

Former education minister Fayez Saudi, who will be a keynote speaker during the conference, told The Jordan Times that “Jordan has been witnessing a curriculum crisis since the 80s”.

“We have a huge problem with school curricula that could be traced back to the late 80s. The education sector has been plagued with instability in policies and curricula which have been changed many times by the large number of ministers of education,” former MP Rula Hroub told The Jordan Times.

Both Saudi and Hroub stressed the need to improve the living conditions of teachers, whom they described as “the cornerstone of the education process”.

“For political, social and economical reasons we turned away from our teachers and did not provide them with enough support. Many teacher training centers were shut down in favour of universities, which also affected the level of instructors’ skills and, as a result, education outcomes”, Saudi added.

Hroub also highlighted the lack of teacher training and habilitation centres. “Although Queen Rania Teachers Academy is doing a good job, they are only training 150 teachers annually of the more than 150,000 teachers in the Kingdom”.

“This situation will take us to a disaster,” Hroub said, adding, “We have been witnessing a decline in the quality of education and outcomes since two decades.”

“We should all be part of the solution. It is not the responsibility of a single entity to come up with a solution this should come as a result to an inclusive dialogue with all stakeholders”, Saudi said.

Islamists, stakeholders to discuss ‘curriculum crisis’ in Kingdom