Three prominent American universities — the University of Texas at Austin, the University of California, Berkeley, and Stanford University — are starting five-year partnerships, worth $25 million or more, with King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, a graduate-level research university being built in Saudi Arabia.
Under the agreements, the mechanical engineering department at Berkeley, the computer-science department and Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering at Stanford, and the Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences at the University of Texas will help pick the faculty and develop the curriculum for the new university, known by the acronym Kaust, which is scheduled to open next year with a $10 billion endowment.
Over the five years, each university will receive a $10 million gift, $10 million for research on their home campus and $5 million for research at Kaust, as well as administrative costs.
“The agreement will allow us to improve our facilities here in California, and fund a stream of graduate students, without taxing our existing infrastructure,” said Albert Pisano, the chairman of Berkeley’s mechanical engineering department, which he said had voted 34 to 2 to proceed with the agreement. “We’re going to work on projects that are good for the Middle East and for California, like energy sources beyond petroleum, improved water desalination, and solar energy in the desert.”
Despite its enormous oil wealth, Saudi Arabia lacks world-class research universities. In the last few years, as the Persian Gulf nations have begun to worry about the eventual need to convert from an oil-based economy to a knowledge-based economy, they have started offering lavish inducements to American universities to bring their expertise to the region.
Although men and women will be able to mingle freely at the new university, faculty members at the American institutions said they were concerned about the possible pitfalls of working in a society where women cannot drive, gay rights do not exist and Israelis are not welcome.
The agreements do contain an exit clause. “We have a 30-day cancellation provision, allowing us to leave the agreement with no penalty if at any time we are dissatisfied,” Dr. Pisano said.
University officials said they had addressed the issues of academic and personal freedom head-on.
“We are working with a university that has guaranteed nondiscrimination on the basis of race, religion or gender,” said Peter Glynn, director of the Stanford institute. “We recognize that this university operates in Saudi Arabia. Having said that, this university recognizes that if it wants to be world-class, it has to be able to freely attract the best students and faculty from around the world.”
He acknowledged that the issue could be sticky. “We have several Israeli faculty involved with this, but to be honest, there’s very little of what Stanford will be doing that will involve travel to Saudi Arabia,” he said. He added that Stanford’s main role would be devising the curriculum and recruiting initial faculty members, from around the world. “We believe this university can have a major impact in Saudi Arabia and in the region, and that’s why we’re doing this.”
Kaust has already announced partnerships with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, the Institut Français du Pétrole, the National University of Singapore, the American University of Cairo, the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and others.
-- The New York Times, By TAMAR LEWIN
Showing posts with label KAUST. Show all posts
Showing posts with label KAUST. Show all posts
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Monday, December 17, 2007
Saudi Arabia: Reforms in Higher Education Raise Questions
In a lavish ceremony in November in the remote port town of Thuwal, a three-hour drive from Mecca, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia laid the cornerstone for a new Western-style science and technology university. "Based on Islam's eternal values, which urge us to seek knowledge and develop ourselves and our societies, and relying on God Almighty, we declare the establishment of King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, and hope it will be a source of knowledge and serve as a bridge between people and cultures," he told the crowd of over 1,500 national and foreign dignitaries. Observers, however, are skeptical about the viability of such new institutions.
The King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) is at the forefront of Saudi Arabia's new efforts to reform an antiquated higher education system. The country’s Ministry of Higher Education—established in 1975—has been mainly controlled by the Wahhabi elite, who emphasize religious instruction over liberal arts or sciences. As recently as 2003, Saudi Arabia had only eight universities for a population of over 22 million people—75 percent of them under 30—and spent less than a quarter of one percent of its GDP on research, as opposed to 10 percent spent on the military.
Under the leadership of reform-minded King Abdullah, the country has begun a massive overhaul of its higher education system. The Ministry of Higher Education has opened more than 100 new universities and colleges in the past four years, funded by a $15-billion budget, which has tripled since 2004. KAUST's $10-billion endowment makes it the sixth richest university in the world before even opening its doors. King Saud University, the nation's largest, recently announced the hiring of twenty-four Nobel laureates. The government has also lifted its ban on private universities, and will be providing $10-million toward scholarships and building costs for the half-dozen private institutions already in the works.
As a personal project of the King—and under the aegis of the relatively secular Saudi oil company Aramco rather than the Ministry—KAUST will push social boundaries by becoming the Kingdom’s first co-educational university. Some of the new private universities are hoping to follow in its path. Among KAUST's advisors are high-ranking administrators from Cornell University, Imperial College of London, and the National Academy of Sciences. Private universities have already teamed up with consultants from Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Cambridge.
Education reform is also part of a set of broader efforts to diversify the Saudi economy and “Saudify” the Kingdom's companies, a strategy to address the staggering youth unemployment rate of 30 percent. In turn, most of the reforms are directed toward the sciences, high-tech, and other lucrative fields. "We've tailored most of out new programs—I'd say close to 80 percent of them—to the labor market needs," says Mohammed al-Ohali, deputy minister of higher education. Many university administrators also admit that focusing on the sciences—rather than politics, literature or history—will help them escape the scorn of the Saudi religious elite.
One of the primary challenges facing these new universities will be attracting Western faculty to a country known for its severe social restrictions, such as the ban on alcohol, most public entertainment, and women’s driving as well as restrictions on women's dress. To overcome these challenges, KAUST is planning on spending $100-million a year on international research grants and academic prizes, and will shoulder the costs of jointly hiring professors at foreign universities who will split their time between the partners. The university also hopes to create a steady pipeline of graduate students by funding 250 undergraduates every year to complete their studies abroad in exchange for commitments to enroll in KAUST as graduate students.
But critics both inside and outside the Kingdom are skeptical that these new universities, even with Western faculty and Western-designed curricula, will be able to flourish in the restrictive Saudi environment. "It's not only about buildings and labs and big names and throwing money at everything," says Khalid al-Dakhil, a former professor at King Saud University who was forced to retire early because of his controversial research about Saudi history. "If you want to build a Western-style university in Saudi Arabia, you have to remember that these institutions prospered because of the freedom of those societies. You have to be comfortable asking questions."
Even the special status accorded to KAUST by the King's sponsorship may not be enough to protect it from adversarial forces in Saudi society. Hassan al-Husseini, a former administrator at the King Fahad University of Petroleum and Minerals, which was Saudi Aramco's first attempt at starting a Western-style university, cautions that "when something is established by royal edict, then that same thing can be reversed by another royal edict. It's not like you have legal protection for such things in Saudi Arabia."
- Zvika Krieger, a special correspondent for Newsweek and Middle East correspondent for the Chronicle of Higher Education.
The King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) is at the forefront of Saudi Arabia's new efforts to reform an antiquated higher education system. The country’s Ministry of Higher Education—established in 1975—has been mainly controlled by the Wahhabi elite, who emphasize religious instruction over liberal arts or sciences. As recently as 2003, Saudi Arabia had only eight universities for a population of over 22 million people—75 percent of them under 30—and spent less than a quarter of one percent of its GDP on research, as opposed to 10 percent spent on the military.
Under the leadership of reform-minded King Abdullah, the country has begun a massive overhaul of its higher education system. The Ministry of Higher Education has opened more than 100 new universities and colleges in the past four years, funded by a $15-billion budget, which has tripled since 2004. KAUST's $10-billion endowment makes it the sixth richest university in the world before even opening its doors. King Saud University, the nation's largest, recently announced the hiring of twenty-four Nobel laureates. The government has also lifted its ban on private universities, and will be providing $10-million toward scholarships and building costs for the half-dozen private institutions already in the works.
As a personal project of the King—and under the aegis of the relatively secular Saudi oil company Aramco rather than the Ministry—KAUST will push social boundaries by becoming the Kingdom’s first co-educational university. Some of the new private universities are hoping to follow in its path. Among KAUST's advisors are high-ranking administrators from Cornell University, Imperial College of London, and the National Academy of Sciences. Private universities have already teamed up with consultants from Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Cambridge.
Education reform is also part of a set of broader efforts to diversify the Saudi economy and “Saudify” the Kingdom's companies, a strategy to address the staggering youth unemployment rate of 30 percent. In turn, most of the reforms are directed toward the sciences, high-tech, and other lucrative fields. "We've tailored most of out new programs—I'd say close to 80 percent of them—to the labor market needs," says Mohammed al-Ohali, deputy minister of higher education. Many university administrators also admit that focusing on the sciences—rather than politics, literature or history—will help them escape the scorn of the Saudi religious elite.
One of the primary challenges facing these new universities will be attracting Western faculty to a country known for its severe social restrictions, such as the ban on alcohol, most public entertainment, and women’s driving as well as restrictions on women's dress. To overcome these challenges, KAUST is planning on spending $100-million a year on international research grants and academic prizes, and will shoulder the costs of jointly hiring professors at foreign universities who will split their time between the partners. The university also hopes to create a steady pipeline of graduate students by funding 250 undergraduates every year to complete their studies abroad in exchange for commitments to enroll in KAUST as graduate students.
But critics both inside and outside the Kingdom are skeptical that these new universities, even with Western faculty and Western-designed curricula, will be able to flourish in the restrictive Saudi environment. "It's not only about buildings and labs and big names and throwing money at everything," says Khalid al-Dakhil, a former professor at King Saud University who was forced to retire early because of his controversial research about Saudi history. "If you want to build a Western-style university in Saudi Arabia, you have to remember that these institutions prospered because of the freedom of those societies. You have to be comfortable asking questions."
Even the special status accorded to KAUST by the King's sponsorship may not be enough to protect it from adversarial forces in Saudi society. Hassan al-Husseini, a former administrator at the King Fahad University of Petroleum and Minerals, which was Saudi Aramco's first attempt at starting a Western-style university, cautions that "when something is established by royal edict, then that same thing can be reversed by another royal edict. It's not like you have legal protection for such things in Saudi Arabia."
- Zvika Krieger, a special correspondent for Newsweek and Middle East correspondent for the Chronicle of Higher Education.
Saudi Arabia: Reforms in higher education raise questions.
The King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) is at the forefront of Saudi Arabia's new efforts to reform an antiquated higher education system.
The country’s Ministry of Higher Education—established in 1975—has been mainly controlled by the Wahhabi elite, who emphasize religious instruction over liberal arts or sciences. Under the leadership of reform-minded King Abdullah, the country has begun a massive overhaul of its higher education system.
The Ministry of Higher Education has opened more than 100 new universities and colleges in the past four years, funded by a $15-billion budget, which has tripled since 2004.
KAUST's $10-billion endowment makes it the sixth richest university in the world before even opening its doors. King Saud University, the nation's largest, recently announced the hiring of twenty-four Nobel laureates.
The government has also lifted its ban on private universities, and will be providing $10-million toward scholarships and building costs for the half-dozen private institutions already in the works.
(Arab Reform Bulletin, December)
The country’s Ministry of Higher Education—established in 1975—has been mainly controlled by the Wahhabi elite, who emphasize religious instruction over liberal arts or sciences. Under the leadership of reform-minded King Abdullah, the country has begun a massive overhaul of its higher education system.
The Ministry of Higher Education has opened more than 100 new universities and colleges in the past four years, funded by a $15-billion budget, which has tripled since 2004.
KAUST's $10-billion endowment makes it the sixth richest university in the world before even opening its doors. King Saud University, the nation's largest, recently announced the hiring of twenty-four Nobel laureates.
The government has also lifted its ban on private universities, and will be providing $10-million toward scholarships and building costs for the half-dozen private institutions already in the works.
(Arab Reform Bulletin, December)
Friday, October 26, 2007
Saudi Arabia: King Tries to Grow Modern Ideas in Desert
Oct 26, 2007
New York Times, A1
THANASSIS CAMBANIS
JIDDA, Saudi Arabia, Oct. 25 - On a marshy peninsula 50 miles from this Red Sea port, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is staking $12.5 billion on a gargantuan bid to catch up with the West in science and technology.
Between an oil refinery and the sea, the monarch is building from scratch a graduate research institution that will have one of the 10 largest endowments in the world, worth more than $10 billion.
Its planners say men and women will study side by side in an enclave walled off from the rest of Saudi society, the country's notorious religious police will be barred and all religious and ethnic groups will be welcome in a push for academic freedom and international collaboration sure to test the kingdom's cultural and religious limits.
This undertaking is directly at odds with the kingdom's religious establishment, which severely limits women's rights and rejects coeducation and robust liberal inquiry as unthinkable.
For the new institution, the king has cut his own education ministry out the loop, hiring the state-owned oil giant Saudi Aramco to build the campus, create its curriculum and attract foreigners.
Supporters of what is to be called the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, or Kaust, wonder whether the king is simply building another gated island to be dominated by foreigners, like the compounds for oil industry workers that have existed here for decades, or creating an institution that will have a real impact on Saudi society and the rest of the Arab world.
"There are two Saudi Arabias," said Jamal Khashoggi, the editor of Al Watan, a newspaper. "The question is which Saudi Arabia will take over."
The king has broken taboos, declaring that the Arabs have fallen critically behind much of the modern world in intellectual achievement and that his country depends too much on oil and not enough on creating wealth through innovation.
"There is a deep knowledge gap separating the Arab and Islamic nations from the process and progress of contemporary global civilization," said Abdallah S. Jumah, the chief executive of Saudi Aramco. "We are no longer keeping pace with the advances of our era."
Traditional Saudi practice is on display at the biggest public universities, where the Islamic authorities vet the curriculum, medical researchers tread carefully around controversial subjects like evolution, and female and male students enter classrooms through separate doors and follow lectures while separated by partitions.
Old-fashioned values even seeped into the carefully staged groundbreaking ceremony on Sunday for King Abdullah's new university, at which organizers distributed an issue of the magazine The Economist with a special advertisement for the university wrapped around the cover. State censors had physically torn from each copy an article about Saudi legal reform titled "Law of God Versus Law of Man," leaving a jagged edge.
Despite the obstacles, the king intends to make the university a showcase for modernization. The festive groundbreaking and accompanying symposium about the future of the modern university were devised partly as a recruiting tool for international academics.
"Getting the faculty will be the biggest challenge," said Ahmed F. Ghoniem, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who is consulting for the new university. "That will make it or break it." Professor Ghoniem has advised the new university to lure international academics with laboratory facilities and grants they cannot find at home, but he also believes that established professors will be reluctant to leave their universities for a small enclave in the desert.
"You have to create an environment where you can connect to the outside world," said Professor Ghoniem, who is from Egypt. "You cannot work in isolation."
He admitted that even though he admired the idea of the new university, he would be unlikely to abandon his post at M.I.T. to move to Saudi Arabia.
Festivities at the construction site on Sunday for 1,500 dignitaries included a laser light show and a mockup of the planned campus that filled an entire room. The king laid a crystal cornerstone into a stainless steel shaft on wheels.
Cranes tore out mangroves and pounded the swampland with 20-ton blocks into a surface firm enough to build the campus on. Inside a tent, the king, his honor guard wearing flowing robes and curved daggers, and an array of Aramco officials in suits took to a shiny stage lighted with green and blue neon tubing, like an MTV awards show. Mist from dry ice shrouded the stage, music blared in surround sound, and holographic projections served as a backdrop to some of the speeches.
From a laconic monarch known for his austerity, the pomp, along with a rare speech by the king himself, was intended to send a strong signal, according to the team charged with building and staffing the new campus within two years.
The king is lavishing the institution not only with money, but also with his full political endorsement, intended to stave off internal challenges from conservatives and to win over foreign scholars who doubt that academic freedom can thrive here.
The new project is giving hope to Saudi scholars who until the king's push to reform education in the last few years have endured stagnant research budgets and continue to face extensive government red tape.
"Because Aramco is founding the university, I believe it will have freedom," said Abdulmalik A. Aljinaidi, dean of the research and consultation institute at King Abdulaziz University, Jidda's biggest, with more than 40,000 students. "For Kaust to succeed, it will have to be free of all the restrictions and bureaucracy we face as a public university."
Even in the most advanced genetics labs at King Abdulaziz, the women wear full face coverings, and female students can meet with male advisers only in carefully controlled public free zones like the library. Scientists there tread carefully when they do research in genetics, stem cells or evolution, for fear of offending Islamic social mores.
Even in Jidda, the kingdom's most liberal city, a status rooted in its history as a trading outpost, change comes slowly. This month the governor allowed families to celebrate the post-Ramadan Id al-Fitr holiday in public, effectively allowing men and women to socialize publicly on the same streets for the first time.
The religious police were accused of beating a man to death because he was suspected of selling alcohol. Conservatives have fended off efforts by women to secure the right to drive or to run for office, although women have made considerable gains in access to segregated education and workplaces.
Against this backdrop, said Mr. Khashoggi, the newspaper editor, the king has conceived of the new university as a liberalizing counterweight, whose success depends on how much it engages the rest of Saudi society. "Nobody wants to live in a ghetto, even a nice one," Mr. Khashoggi said. "As a Saudi, I say, let's open up."
Upon completion, the energy-efficient campus will house 20,000 faculty and staff members, students and their families. Social rules will be more relaxed, as they are in the compounds where foreign oil workers live; women will be allowed to drive, for example. But the kingdom?s laws will still apply: Israelis, barred by law from visiting Saudi Arabia, will not be able to collaborate with the university. And one staple of campus life worldwide will be missing: alcohol.
The university president will be a foreigner, and the faculty members and graduate students at first will be overwhelmingly foreign as well. Generous scholarships will finance the 2,000 graduate students; planners expect the Saudi share of the student body to increase over the years as scholarships aimed at promising current undergraduates help groom them for graduate studies at the new university.
The university's entire model is built around partnerships with other international universities, and faculty members are expected to have permanent bases at other research institutions abroad.
The university will also rely on a new free-market model. The faculty members will not have tenure, and almost all of them will have joint appointments. While the university will initially be awash in money, its faculty and graduate students will still have to compete with top international institutions for the limited pool of private money that underwrites most graduate research.
Suhair el-Qurashi, dean of the private all-female Dar Al Hekma College, often attacked as 'bad' and 'liberal,' said a vigorous example of free-thinking at the university would embolden the many Saudis who back the king's quest to reform long-stagnant higher education.
"The king knows he will face some backlash and bad publicity," Ms. Qurashi said. "I think the system is moving in the right direction."
New York Times, A1
THANASSIS CAMBANIS
JIDDA, Saudi Arabia, Oct. 25 - On a marshy peninsula 50 miles from this Red Sea port, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is staking $12.5 billion on a gargantuan bid to catch up with the West in science and technology.
Between an oil refinery and the sea, the monarch is building from scratch a graduate research institution that will have one of the 10 largest endowments in the world, worth more than $10 billion.
Its planners say men and women will study side by side in an enclave walled off from the rest of Saudi society, the country's notorious religious police will be barred and all religious and ethnic groups will be welcome in a push for academic freedom and international collaboration sure to test the kingdom's cultural and religious limits.
This undertaking is directly at odds with the kingdom's religious establishment, which severely limits women's rights and rejects coeducation and robust liberal inquiry as unthinkable.
For the new institution, the king has cut his own education ministry out the loop, hiring the state-owned oil giant Saudi Aramco to build the campus, create its curriculum and attract foreigners.
Supporters of what is to be called the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, or Kaust, wonder whether the king is simply building another gated island to be dominated by foreigners, like the compounds for oil industry workers that have existed here for decades, or creating an institution that will have a real impact on Saudi society and the rest of the Arab world.
"There are two Saudi Arabias," said Jamal Khashoggi, the editor of Al Watan, a newspaper. "The question is which Saudi Arabia will take over."
The king has broken taboos, declaring that the Arabs have fallen critically behind much of the modern world in intellectual achievement and that his country depends too much on oil and not enough on creating wealth through innovation.
"There is a deep knowledge gap separating the Arab and Islamic nations from the process and progress of contemporary global civilization," said Abdallah S. Jumah, the chief executive of Saudi Aramco. "We are no longer keeping pace with the advances of our era."
Traditional Saudi practice is on display at the biggest public universities, where the Islamic authorities vet the curriculum, medical researchers tread carefully around controversial subjects like evolution, and female and male students enter classrooms through separate doors and follow lectures while separated by partitions.
Old-fashioned values even seeped into the carefully staged groundbreaking ceremony on Sunday for King Abdullah's new university, at which organizers distributed an issue of the magazine The Economist with a special advertisement for the university wrapped around the cover. State censors had physically torn from each copy an article about Saudi legal reform titled "Law of God Versus Law of Man," leaving a jagged edge.
Despite the obstacles, the king intends to make the university a showcase for modernization. The festive groundbreaking and accompanying symposium about the future of the modern university were devised partly as a recruiting tool for international academics.
"Getting the faculty will be the biggest challenge," said Ahmed F. Ghoniem, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who is consulting for the new university. "That will make it or break it." Professor Ghoniem has advised the new university to lure international academics with laboratory facilities and grants they cannot find at home, but he also believes that established professors will be reluctant to leave their universities for a small enclave in the desert.
"You have to create an environment where you can connect to the outside world," said Professor Ghoniem, who is from Egypt. "You cannot work in isolation."
He admitted that even though he admired the idea of the new university, he would be unlikely to abandon his post at M.I.T. to move to Saudi Arabia.
Festivities at the construction site on Sunday for 1,500 dignitaries included a laser light show and a mockup of the planned campus that filled an entire room. The king laid a crystal cornerstone into a stainless steel shaft on wheels.
Cranes tore out mangroves and pounded the swampland with 20-ton blocks into a surface firm enough to build the campus on. Inside a tent, the king, his honor guard wearing flowing robes and curved daggers, and an array of Aramco officials in suits took to a shiny stage lighted with green and blue neon tubing, like an MTV awards show. Mist from dry ice shrouded the stage, music blared in surround sound, and holographic projections served as a backdrop to some of the speeches.
From a laconic monarch known for his austerity, the pomp, along with a rare speech by the king himself, was intended to send a strong signal, according to the team charged with building and staffing the new campus within two years.
The king is lavishing the institution not only with money, but also with his full political endorsement, intended to stave off internal challenges from conservatives and to win over foreign scholars who doubt that academic freedom can thrive here.
The new project is giving hope to Saudi scholars who until the king's push to reform education in the last few years have endured stagnant research budgets and continue to face extensive government red tape.
"Because Aramco is founding the university, I believe it will have freedom," said Abdulmalik A. Aljinaidi, dean of the research and consultation institute at King Abdulaziz University, Jidda's biggest, with more than 40,000 students. "For Kaust to succeed, it will have to be free of all the restrictions and bureaucracy we face as a public university."
Even in the most advanced genetics labs at King Abdulaziz, the women wear full face coverings, and female students can meet with male advisers only in carefully controlled public free zones like the library. Scientists there tread carefully when they do research in genetics, stem cells or evolution, for fear of offending Islamic social mores.
Even in Jidda, the kingdom's most liberal city, a status rooted in its history as a trading outpost, change comes slowly. This month the governor allowed families to celebrate the post-Ramadan Id al-Fitr holiday in public, effectively allowing men and women to socialize publicly on the same streets for the first time.
The religious police were accused of beating a man to death because he was suspected of selling alcohol. Conservatives have fended off efforts by women to secure the right to drive or to run for office, although women have made considerable gains in access to segregated education and workplaces.
Against this backdrop, said Mr. Khashoggi, the newspaper editor, the king has conceived of the new university as a liberalizing counterweight, whose success depends on how much it engages the rest of Saudi society. "Nobody wants to live in a ghetto, even a nice one," Mr. Khashoggi said. "As a Saudi, I say, let's open up."
Upon completion, the energy-efficient campus will house 20,000 faculty and staff members, students and their families. Social rules will be more relaxed, as they are in the compounds where foreign oil workers live; women will be allowed to drive, for example. But the kingdom?s laws will still apply: Israelis, barred by law from visiting Saudi Arabia, will not be able to collaborate with the university. And one staple of campus life worldwide will be missing: alcohol.
The university president will be a foreigner, and the faculty members and graduate students at first will be overwhelmingly foreign as well. Generous scholarships will finance the 2,000 graduate students; planners expect the Saudi share of the student body to increase over the years as scholarships aimed at promising current undergraduates help groom them for graduate studies at the new university.
The university's entire model is built around partnerships with other international universities, and faculty members are expected to have permanent bases at other research institutions abroad.
The university will also rely on a new free-market model. The faculty members will not have tenure, and almost all of them will have joint appointments. While the university will initially be awash in money, its faculty and graduate students will still have to compete with top international institutions for the limited pool of private money that underwrites most graduate research.
Suhair el-Qurashi, dean of the private all-female Dar Al Hekma College, often attacked as 'bad' and 'liberal,' said a vigorous example of free-thinking at the university would embolden the many Saudis who back the king's quest to reform long-stagnant higher education.
"The king knows he will face some backlash and bad publicity," Ms. Qurashi said. "I think the system is moving in the right direction."
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