Does the King’s Academy in Jordan present a real possibility for change in the MENA?

This clip was aired on Good Morning America on October 22nd on the King’s Academy in Jordan. According to the clip, the private, co-ed boarding school is noteworthy because of its break with tradition: it emphasizes critical thinking and cooperative learning among students from Jordan, the Middle East and beyond. The co-ed classrooms encourage young men and women to view each other as classmates, peers and friends. In the dining halls, students eat with teachers at mixed tables to encourage camaraderie.

Students at the King’s Academy in Jordan

I agree with many statements in the clip. In a country where public schools are separated by gender, co-ed classrooms are a way to foster respect and can lay the groundwork for a more gender-equitable workforce. According to a report by the World Bank, schools in many countries throughout the MENA region still rely on rote learning in order to pass national standardized tests. Curriculum that emphasizes the questioning assumptions and encourages problem solving creates independent thinkers and moves away from memorization of facts to pass tests.

King Abdullah II established the King’s Academy in 2008, inspired by his positive experiences at a US boarding school.

In its praise of the school, Good Morning America emphasizes that the King’s Academy’s goal is reduce the gap between the rich and poor, and claims that nearly half the student body receives financial aid. The school’s website, though, advertises a tuition rate of $25,440 a year for day students and as much as $36,800 for full boarding students. To receive financial aid, an application must be submitted annually. To be fair, this tuition rate does include access to state of the art facilities and includes field trips as well as a laptop to use while a student, but it can hardly be a school accessible to many Jordanians.

This German article claims that 75% of the country’s wealth is in the hands of just 30% of the population. The regional average of students in private primary and secondary school is reported to be 24% by the World Bank. (For some context, about 10% of primary and secondary US students were in private schools in 2009-2010. View the report here.) This wealth gap was one of the the root complaints of protests in Jordan during the Arab Spring 2011 that caused King Abdullah II to fire his cabinet and change his prime minister in February 2011. This increased gap may be a response to the shift to a global economy. As the country’s economy becomes more dependent on global markets, high-income parents will send their children to private schools that can provide students globally competitive skills. The powerful and rich who send their children to these private schools are less willing to support public education.

The decrease in funding in quality public education may also be attributed to structural adjustment programs imposed by international organizations. To alleviate the fiscal deficit, in the early 1990’s the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund supported reforms to cut social expenditures and introduction of user fees for primary and secondary public education.

In addition, I must also mention how I was struck by how the clip presents images and metaphors that reinforce common and subtle stereotypes of the Middle East. A voiceover characterizes Jordan and the Levant as a “region steeped in conservative tradition” as the video shows images of sheep herders, a woman in a headscarf standing in front of a dilapidated house and a weathered man in a headdress. These images are juxtaposed with the images of new Spanish-style architecture on the academy’s campus and the traditional Middle Eastern music fades to the sound of students discussing math in English. This use of language, images and music reinforces the commonly held oversimplification that traditional mores in the Middle East are negative, are the cause poverty and are in dire need of change (which in this case, comes from the West).