JEDDAH: The SR20-billion new campus of Princess Nora bint Abdulrahman University (PNU) along Airport Road in Riyadh will boost women's higher education in the Kingdom, said Huda Al-Ameel, the newly appointed PNU president.
"The new campus, covering eight million square meters, is considered the largest women-only university in the world," said Al-Ameel. Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah will open the campus on Sunday in the presence of senior royal family members, ministers and foreign diplomats.
Al-Ameel said the huge campus was completed in a record time of less than three years on the instructions of King Abdullah. "We are grateful to King Abdullah for this vital project, which will surely encourage PNU staff and students to exploit this state-of-the art facility to excel in education," she said.
Apart from administrative buildings, the new campus includes a 700-bed university hospital, 15 colleges, a central library, a conference hall, laboratories and three research centers for nanotechnology, information technology and biosciences. It also comprises staff housing units, student hostels, primary, intermediate and secondary schools and recreational facilities.
King Abdullah laid the foundation stone for the university in October 2008. Designed to accommodate more than 50,000 students, PNU has been described as a milestone in the history of women's education in the Kingdom. The university has a high-tech transport system with automatic and computer-controlled vehicles linking all important facilities on the campus.
Munira Al-Abdan, vice president for studies and development, highlighted PNU's efforts to improve the standard of its graduates in terms of academic qualification and skills. "We have designed our academic programs to meet job market requirements," she said.
"We provide our graduates with additional training courses to strengthen their competitive capabilities in the job market," she added. PNU has taken measures to achieve continuous improvement in the quality of education. "We also want to make PNU a paperless university by completing all internal activities electronically," Al-Abdan said.
About the university's social responsibility, Al-Abdan said PNU has been providing consultancy services to ministries and public and private organizations on various social issues. "We conduct studies on social issues to find viable solutions." PNU also conducts a career day with the participation of leading companies in order to find employment opportunities for its graduates.
Firdous Al-Saleh, vice president for higher studies and scientific studies, said the university's library has six million titles including important reference books. "King Abdullah has been closely following the campus project work," said Walid Al-Mehwas, another vice president.
At present there are more than 28,000 students and about 3,000 staff members. There are colleges for medicine, dentistry, nursing, information technology, kindergarten education, languages, instant translation and pharmacy. It has 32 affiliated colleges in 17 cities and townships in the Riyadh province.
Figures released by UNESCO show that women make up 58 percent of the total student population of Saudi universities.
© Arab News 2011
