1:30 P.M. EDT
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MODERATOR: (In progress.) Mr. David Arnold, who is President of American University of Cairo and he's here today to talk about higher education in global development and issues of higher education. Welcome, Dr. -- Mr. Arnold.
MR. ARNOLD: Thank you very much.
MODERATOR: If you could identify yourself when you first speak and give us your agency.
QUESTION: I'm Heather Yamour with the Kuwait News Agency. If you could give us just sort of an overview of the summit that you attended yesterday?
MR. ARNOLD: Well, this was a very significant meeting in the sense of bringing together leaders from higher education institutions, both here in the U.S. and around the world, to think together, to talk together about the role that our institutions can play and should play in terms of efforts to advance economic and social development in different regions of the world.
It is significant in a couple of respects. First of all, for many, many years, much of the energy of the donor community has been concentrated on basic education. Primary and secondary education and higher education has not really been the main focus of interest from the development agencies for, I think, much of the last 20 years. So this summit really signals a shift in that thinking and a recognition that higher education institutions and universities have a critically important role to play in terms of human capital and as catalysts for economic growth and development for the development of civil society institutions, for the education and training of leaders in different countries and different regions of the world. So it really has a symbolic importance and significance that may not be as widely understood to the public as it is to those of us that have been working in the higher education and the development sector.
The other thing that I think is very significant about this summit is the level of participation that it brought together. We have five cabinet secretaries in addition to Administrator Henrietta Fore. We had presidents of major U.S. research institutions: Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Duke University, Cornell. It was a very, very impressive gathering, both of leaders from U.S. institutions and their counterparts from, really, all corners of the globe that had came together to really talk about what we're doing, how we can do it better, what partnerships are possible between and among universities to enhance our effectiveness, and really to create a network of people that really are fully committed and engaged in the task of global development.
QUESTION: Now can you tell me some of the latest partnerships that are going on between U.S. institutions and those abroad, especially in the Middle East?
MR. ARNOLD: There's a wide range of linkages and projects that entail U.S. institutions working with institutions in our region. For example, there have been efforts in the past to develop joint MBA programs. There's a program I know about right now in Egypt that is developing a new master of law, then an LLM program that is a joint between Indiana University and Cairo University.
There are consortia arrangements. For example, we are part of a consortium that works on training and development of the field of Middle East studies. We have a relationship and partnership with the University of California Davis as part of a network of institutions that are working on a variety of issues that are of common concern; water, resource management, gender issues, that it's a research consortium. So there are a lot of individual initiatives. The aim of this conference was really to take stock of what's working, where, and to explore the possibilities for developing new initiatives going forward.
QUESTION: Well, what is working, and where?
MR. ARNOLD: Well, the short answer is different things in different places. And I think that what emerged out of this meeting was an understanding and an appreciation of two things that I think are particularly significant.
One is the importance of building partnerships that are sustainable, that -- where the partners really have mutual and shared interests in continuing to work together and to achieve a set of goals and outcomes that are seen as important by both partners or all partners, stakeholders in the process. Unfortunately, I think the landscape is littered with examples where the partnership lasts as long as the money holds out, but when the money runs out, then the partnership disappears. And so I think there was a silver recognition that to be sustainable, the partnerships really had to rely -- some initial seed funding can be very helpful, but there has to be kind of a commitment from both institutions or all of the institutions involved in order to sustain the partnership over time.
The second thing that was sort of a thread running through the conversations was an appreciation of the important role that technology can play, that we no longer have to be in the same physical place in order to work together. And the advent of - you know, use of internet resources, of online access, creates possibilities for collaboration that did not exist in the past. And I think we're only really at the early stages of starting to test and explore and develop those kinds of technology-oriented partnerships and collaborations. And I think that was one of the new things that was discussed and talked about and thought about at the sessions that we had at the State Department.
QUESTION: So can you go more in depth on the internet resources? And although you're in the early stages, where can you take this?
MR. ARNOLD: Well, a good example is what MIT has done in terms of making their course materials - the syllabus, the lectures, the open courseware concept - accessible and available online.
Basically, anybody, whether they're in the U.S. or in sub-Saharan Africa or in Latin America, can basically go online to see how, you know, complex subjects, technical subjects, are being taught at leading research institutions like MIT or Hopkins or Stanford, so that in some respects, the job of the professors and the teachers in developing countries can be simplified a bit if you don't have to create the content, that you have access to content that's been produced by Nobel Prize winning scientists and technology leaders. That enables you to really concentrate on how do you deliver that content in a way that's relevant in the particular environment and social context and cultural context in which you're operating.
So that's perhaps one example, but there are many, many others. We heard a marvelous presentation by Dr. Ismail Serageldin, the Director and Chief Librarian of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, about, you know, the resources that are now available electronically in terms of digital archives, ancient manuscripts that can be downloaded on PDFs that can be resources for scholars and researchers from around the world that would not have access to these materials except in the digitized format of -- that could make this accessible irrespective of where they are. They don't have to physically go to Alexandria or to Cairo to access these rare manuscripts and documents that are now available online or in PDF, you know, files that can be used by scholars and researchers around the world.
QUESTION: Well, how has the current political landscape in the Middle East impacted cultural exchange and these higher education institutions? Has it -- for example, the visa issue, has that had much of an impact?
MR. ARNOLD: Well, I think the short-term effect immediately after 9/11 certainly was to have a significant chilling effect in terms of students, scholars traveling to the United States. I would have to say that very sincere and committed efforts have been made to try and ease the visa restrictions, so I think that the State Department and the, you know, Homeland Security folks have come a long way in terms of opening up and making it more -- making the U.S. more welcoming for students from our part of the world.
Having said that, I think that there is still a hesitation on the part of many students from the Arab world and the Islamic world feeling that they may not be welcome or that they may be threatened, somehow, in coming to study or live or work or do research in the United States. And to some extent, I think what we've seen is a profusion of new branch campuses being open so that as students -- if students can't come to the U.S. higher education system, the U.S. higher education system is coming to them.
And so you have now branch campuses in Education City in Qatar, for example, places like, you know, Cornell, the Virginia Commonwealth University, Texas A & M, Georgetown University opening branch campuses in Qatar, a new campus for NYU opening up in Abu Dahbi. You know, you have the emergence of new American style colleges and universities in places like Zarjah (ph) or in Kuwait that really follow in the footsteps of the pioneers of the American University in Beirut and our own university, the American University in Cairo, that go back decades and, in some cases, you know, nearly a century.
QUESTION: Well, how do these branch campuses compare to the mainland campuses here in the U.S.?
MR. ARNOLD: Well, I think it's too early to tell. They're really just getting started and they have not fully ramped up to full capacity. So I think it's an interesting experiment. It's one that's worth watching and seeing how it develops, both in Qatar and in the Emirates.
But what - the key point is that they're coming there because there is demand. There is a demand for high quality U.S. higher education in the region and enlightened leaders are encouraging and inviting U.S. institutions to respond to that demand. I think that's good and that's healthy and it's a positive thing. So from my perspective, I think, well -- at times we think, well, we're going to have a lot of competition from these new branch campuses or new universities. I think those of us in the higher education field think that competition is a good thing, that -- particularly if it's competition to offer, you know, first rate, high quality university education. Students have more choices, families have more choices. There's value to be gained from diversity in terms of the range of institutions and programs that they offer. So I think, on balance, it's a good and positive development both for the U.S. institutions involved and for the countries and the people that they're trying to serve.
QUESTION: Is there a special demand for certain subjects?
MR. ARNOLD: Well, the - certainly, the highest demand right now that we find is in the areas of business and computer science, IT. Those are fields where there's great demand for the graduates. But we also have a large number of students that are studying journalism and mass communication, students that are going into basic sciences. So, you know, the -- to some extent, you'll find that the demand very much reflects the labor market situation as it exists regionally and internationally.
QUESTION: Well, one of the things Condi Rice talked about yesterday -- this is from her transcripts -- is she mentioned there was a rather intensive dialogue about change and how to bring it about. Now what kind of change are we talking about here?
MR. ARNOLD: Well, she was referring to her discussions with some students that she had met or some leaders, young leaders and activists. I was not part of that conversation and I would hesitate very much to characterize what was said or not said in a meeting that I did not attend.
QUESTION: Okay, that's fair. But in terms of more - well, like -- countries like Saudi Arabia, is there an effort for American style higher education that you see?
MR. ARNOLD: What we're seeing in Saudi Arabia is an emergence of two things. One is an emergence of some new, private institutions of higher education that are very interesting and that are very unique. For example, you have two relatively new private colleges for women in Jeddah, Dar Al Hekma College and Effat College, both of which are -- exclusively focus on women's education, both of which have international faculties, and which are recognized now by the Ministry of Education.
This is a new phenomenon and I think it's a very exciting development and one that bears watching very closely, because the graduates that are coming out of these new colleges really are change agents. I mean, they are women that are going to be going into fields where, traditionally, women have not been welcomed; engineering, for example. You know, there's a lot of interesting possibilities that grow out of that.
The other very, very exciting development that's taken place is the creation of the new King Abdullah University of Science and technology, also known as KAUST for short, which is an effort to create from scratch and build from the ground up a world class research university concentrating on science and technology. This is a post graduate institution that will be doing leading edge research in fields that are directly relevant to the Arab world and to the desert environment in which we live, and that will have partnerships with some of the leading research universities in the U.S. and around the world.
So I think what's happening in higher education in Saudi Arabia does hold a lot of promise and potential over time for creating and building a knowledge society which is ultimately something that we all aspire to see happen in the Arab world, and for training and educating people who are going to be part of a process of economic development and social development and transformation that, over a period of years will, I think, definitely have an impact on the way in which Saudi society develops.
QUESTION: What about the cross-cultural communications? I mean, you see a lot of American - well, universities and higher education institutions in the Middle East, but where's the cross-cultural element of that? Where --
MR. ARNOLD: I think it's in several respects. First of all, one of the things that we've seen at our university is a steady and dramatic growth in the number of American students wanting to come and study in the Middle East. And indeed, I think many of the universities that are setting up Branch Campuses in places like Qatar and Dubai and Abu Dhabi are viewing those campuses as sites for students from the U.S. to study for a semester or for an academic year.
We've seen the number of study abroad students coming to AUC from the U.S. triple in the last four or five years. We've seen steady increases in the number of students coming to do our Arab -- intensive Arabic language programs. The number of graduate students that are coming to AUC for Middle East studies, we now have more than 250 American graduate students out of 1,100 graduate students for the University as a whole.
There's a great interest and a desire on the part of people and young people in the U.S. to learn more and understand more about the Middle East, about the history, the culture, the language, the religion, the politics to get beyond what they see in the news or what they read in USA Today or The New York Times or The Washington Post to get past the stereotypes that exist, and to really understand and appreciate Arab culture at a much more fundamental level. I think that's critically important and that's a role that universities are uniquely well positioned to play.
So we're - as academic institutions, we do not have a political agenda. We don't have a foreign policy agenda. We're there, really, as neutral meeting grounds and as a resource for people from the Arab world to gain a window on the West and on the rest of the world, and for students from outside of the region to gain additional access and insights regarding the region, the people, the society, the culture, all of the aspects that make the Arab world such an interesting and complicated place to understand and to learn about.
QUESTION: Thank you. Thank you.
MR. ARNOLD: Great. Well, good.
MODERATOR: All right. Any other questions? Do you have any questions?
QUESTION: No. I just wanted to add that I'm here on behalf of Higher Education for Development.
MODERATOR: And can you -- for the transcript, can you --
MR. ARNOLD: Identify yourself.
MODERATOR: -- identify yourself?
QUESTION: Sure. My name is Anne Perrelli. I'm the Strategic Communications Manager for Higher Education for Development. And we work with the higher education community in the United States through the six major higher ed associations, the land grant institutions, American Council on Education, community colleges, the independent colleges, and so forth.
And so we help set up these partnerships between U.S. institutions and those abroad with money from USAID and also with the Department of State's Middle East Partnership Initiative. So one of the things that was mentioned was this program in Saudi Arabia, Effat College; that's a partnership that was run with Duke University. And there are a number of other ones worth mentioning, so I would just encourage people who are interested in the topic to find out more about what's going on.
MODERATOR: Thank you very much. And with that, we'll close.
MR. ARNOLD: Thank you. Okay, terrific.
QUESTION: Thank you very much, Mr. Arnold, for coming today.
MR. ARNOLD: My pleasure.
