AMMAN - Unemployment among humanities' graduates is on the rise because these skills are not required by the labour market, according to the findings of a recently released report.
The higher education indicator (HEI) report also revealed that although total unemployment among young people remained relatively high, unemployment has been decreasing for secondary school graduates.
Entitled "Higher Education at a Glance in Jordan", the report is part of the higher education information system, which was developed through Al Manar, a Canadian-funded project at the National Centre for Human Resources Development (NCHRD).
The HEI report indicates that for a knowledge-based economy, namely technological know-how, to be used as a principal engine of human development, policy makers should consider intervention on the "types" of high-level graduates the Kingdom is producing.
Fayez Khasawneh, who headed the study for the NCHRD, explained that during the course of data collection he found the reduced number of students going into applied sciences and the extraordinary number of students going into humanities, very alarming.
"This balance must be changed," Khasawneh said.
The information, which was compiled over a year-and-a-half, used data and tracked trends from 2001 to 2005.
The research group, which used various sources like the bureau of statistics, concerned ministries and universities, called for an appropriate system of data collection after facing difficulty finding accurate and updated information.
"Unemployment for college graduates has been increasing (from 12 per cent in 2001 to 18 per cent in 2005), whereas it remained steady for-secondary (around 14.5 per cent) and non-tertiary post secondary students (around 13.6 per cent), indicating a mismatch between high level skills produced and the skills required by the labour market," the report said.
Theodora De Baz, a faculty member at the Hashemite University college of educational sciences, told The Jordan Times that students who enrol in courses such as "engineering, nursing, applied medical sciences and business administration" are finding jobs.
As for "pure sciences" like geology and chemistry, she suggests that students learn "teaching methods" or curricula that includes pedagogy because it is likely they will only find jobs as teachers in their fields.
The almost 100-page report covers four sets of indictors and focused on the following aspects: Educational attainment and overall human capital in education, rate of inflow and outflow of student population, financial and human resources invested in tertiary education, and educational environment with emphasis on human resources available to students.
These indicators were selected from an internationally accepted list that was developed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development countries.
Other findings included that performance of 15-year-olds in science and mathematics remained relatively low by world standards, although higher than most Arab countries.
Also, 15-year-old students in Jordan showed a large underperformance gap in problem solving as compared to international mean score.
"Only 1 per cent of students achieved an excellent score, 8 per cent scored high, and 60 per cent fell in the low-score category. The high percentage of low scorers point to factors other than the curricula leading to such an outcome," the report said.
One contributing factor could be the overall student/teacher ratio which stands at around 35 in Jordan, while the worldwide standard is around 20, according the report.
As for higher education, it noted an imbalance between the hours spent by students in classrooms and teacher/student contact hours outside classrooms due to heavy instruction loads on staff, high student/teacher ratio and the negative attitude of students towards interaction with faculty.
Reference point
According to the NCHRD, the motive behind developing the HEI and its manual was to create a national reference point for the policy-making process in the higher education sector, in order to establish national benchmarks comparable with international indicators and to search for the institutional set up that will guarantee the sustainability of this work in the future.
Khasawneh, who noted that the research group had a great deal of difficulty compiling information due to "scattered and insufficient data", said the indicator should be compiled on an annual basis if it is to have maximum impact on reform and intervention.
For this to work, academic institutions must establish a system of data collection on all academic, administrative, financial and community activities; listed as a "major" recommendation in the report.
Other policy recommendations included providing incentives for graduate level education in masters and PhD sciences, a system to attract qualified science and math teachers at the basic level and frequent monitoring of student attainment in science and maths through internationally standardised tests to help with revision and development of curricula.
The NCHRD is in the midst of compiling another report for 2006-07, according to Khasawneh.
By Linda Hindi
© Jordan Times 2008
