Consistent with the government’s efforts to expand educational opportunities for Saudi women, the Saudi Ministry of Higher Education recently approved the enrollment of women at Alfaisal University and the University Preparation Program (UPP), a special program that prepares high school graduates to tackle the challenges of university studies, particularly in English, math, and the sciences. As a result, as many as 120 women will begin classes next fall in the UPP, a four-year-old bridge program affiliated with Alfaisal University in Riyadh.

UPP, Alfaisal University campus, Riyadh

Developed by AMIDEAST in close cooperation with the King Faisal Foundation, the UPP has grown quickly since opening its doors in 2007, filling a need in the Saudi educational system for a program that is strong in the sciences and math and prepares students to meet the English requirements for admission to Alfaisal University or top universities worldwide. Beginning with 100 students in 2007-08, it enrolled 180 in 2010–11 and is expected to double its enrollment to 370 next year with the addition of women and an increase in male enrollment to 250.

The ruling by the Ministry of Higher Education gives women the chance to benefit from the UPP’s rigorous curriculum, which promotes the development of critical thinking and other study skills fundamental to success in a western-style education. It also uses the latest in educational technology and teaching methods and provides intensive English language training.

UPP is located on the campus of Alfaisal University and will therefore make use of the classroom design at Alfaisal University, which combines an upper tier for women and lower tier for men. Women on the third and fourth floors can see the same instructors as the men on the lower tiers for lecture-format instruction. However, since UPP’s curriculum is focused more on skill development, relatively few classes utilize the lecture format. This has required UPP to add women teachers to meet the different instructional focus.

The enrollment of women at UPP comes amid an expansion of educational opportunity for Saudi women in the Kingdom that is preparing a generation of highly educated women who will seek ways to participate and engage in the development of their society. Alfaisal University plans to admit its first women students next fall, while the Princess Nora bint Abdulrahman University (PNU), also in Riyadh, recently moved to a modern, new campus, which will enable it to expand its enrollment of 28,000 to 50,000.

― Appeared in AMIDEAST Impact Newsletter, May/June 2011