“There are words that say nothing, and there is silence that says everything.” – William Shakespeare
We have not yet exhausted the painful reality related to our appending the list of global results for the Times exams, and before that the MEEZA and PEARLS tests at the regional and global levels, until the Ministry of Education surprised us, and less than a month after the resounding announcement of the results, specifically on the first of December of the year 2020, with the request addressed to the Supreme Council for Planning and Development that included Suspending only 4 projects out of 5 that represents the Ministry of Education’s development plan for the years 2020-2025.
Really astonishing! How can the Ministry of Education, with the diversity of its services, the nature of its impact, the size of its beneficiaries, and its poor condition, have the number of its development projects only 5? At the very least, it is in dire need of national rescue projects to be the main theme of its development plan, related to ensuring equal education for all, managing development processes and directing them with efficient human resources, governance of the education sector, providing a supportive and stimulating infrastructure that is compatible with the requirements of learning, and matching the outputs of educational institutions with the requirements of The labor market, the localization of the culture of innovation and institutional work, the promotion of community partnership based on specialization, the preservation of Kuwaiti values, customs and traditions, and the promotion and respect of other cultures.
The wonder lies in some of the projects that the ministry asked to stop, and the orphan project that it clung to. Two educators do not disagree that the basis for the success of the educational process and the cornerstone of its development and upgrading is the teacher, so the Ministry of Education graciously cancels the first project for the development of educational and school departments, not only that, but She asked to stop the second project related to the development of school equipment in public education schools, and by this she not only refrained from developing the educational and educational system, which is in dire need for workers in it to keep pace with their peers in neighboring countries, at the very least, but also stopped projects to develop their work environment and modernize their tools, and we all know that our brothers from Workers in the educational field, headed by school leaders and educational families, are the ones who adopt, personally and in the form of creative initiatives, to develop themselves, update their tools, and provide them as much as possible for their surroundings (God bless you).
As for the third project that was requested to be stopped, it is the project to diversify the paths of secondary education. The Corona pandemic, with all its accumulations, has proven fragility, weakness, and the failure of the educational system and its outputs to keep pace with the needs of the labor market. One of the parts on which the continuity and stability of the state are based, and not just the ministry.
When looking at the project that the Ministry adhered to and related to the development of curricula, we find that we have not learned from our previous mistakes, but rather we are still deliberately falling into them, but this time the matter will have a different impact. Its content and stripping it of its authentic tools will overburden the educational field and distance it from the main role assigned to it, and these actions will be reflected in the results and form of educational outputs.
In the end, it is an invitation to stand on the future of the Ministry of Education, it is a pause to support the government leadership to achieve its aspirations, it is a call to reform what can be fixed, it is an invitation to reflect on the Chinese proverb “The best time to harvest is today and the best time to plant twenty-five years ago.”
Dr. Khaled Al-Nafisi
Published in Al-Qabas newspaper
