"Arab Education Displays its Discontents" by Raja M. Kamal and Tom G. Palmer (Cato Institute: Commentary)

"Arab Education Displays its Discontents" by Raja M. Kamal and Tom G. Palmer (Cato Institute: Commentary): "Despite the flood of billions and billions in oil money to public education, Saudi students consistently score among the worst in math and science. The greatest culprit is the suppression of critical thinking, coupled with limited and weak exposure to math and science. An impressive investment in the infrastructure of higher education has not yielded positive returns. It is as if the state had purchased the most advanced computer hardware, but neglected to secure any software to run it."

"The task facing many Arab countries is acknowledging the priority of education over mere schooling. The answer isn't just spending more money. Alchemy didn't fail because of a lack of investments in alchemy academies. A curriculum centered on memorization of dogma should be reformed to allow critical thought, a key ingredient in escaping backwardness. That's as true of judicial backwardness, as it is of economic backwardness. Thorough-going educational reform — involving not merely money, but orientation to the market and critical thinking — can produce judicious judges. Memorization will merely perpetuate backwardness."