JEDDAH/HAIL: Illiteracy has fallen by 70 percent in the last 40 years, according to a Ministry of Education report released recently. The report said that since 1970 when the country had an overall illiteracy rate of 60 percent, the ministry and its Adult Education Administration have worked to bring the rates down to 18.5 percent for women and 7.3 percent for men. By three years ago, 3,444 adult education centers had been opened across the country enabling 80,000 people to enroll and a further 75,000 are obtaining an education through the “Educated Local District Program” launched in 2005. The various initiatives to get adults back into education are, however, fraught with difficulties. Saeed Bin Saha, who studies on the “An Illiteracy-Free Society” program, says the timetable has led many to abandon classes. “Classes start immediately after Maghrib prayers and ends at 9 P.M. Most of the students have only just finished their working day,” he says. “Classes would be better beginning after Isha prayers so that they have a chance to get back to their families first before starting evening classes.” Other concerns from students include obliging those who do not attend on Wednesdays to take Friday classes, overcrowded classes with up to 30 students per teacher, and a lack of instruction in arithmetic. Others say that one year of classes is not enough while some also want to see an increase in the SR1,000 benefit for taking the courses. Abdul Rahman Al-Khashram, who runs Adult Education at the Hail Education Administration, said that a major difficulty is the concentration of programs in remote, rural areas. “These areas have no housing facilities for teachers and the teacher pay of SR2,800 after social insurance is insufficient, particularly for married teachers with children,” Al-Khashram said. “The SR1,000 given to adult students for completing the year's course is also proving not to be a big enough incentive.” Adult education teacher Muhammad Al-Shamrani said that students were not as disciplined as they could be. “Punctuality is a problem with most adult students,” he says. “This disrupts the whole study program.” Despite the difficulties, the recent Ministry of Education report said that it expects the country to be fully literate within three years, a remarkable achievement compared with the figures four decades ago.
