Manama: Bahrain's ministry of education has received more than 50 applications seeking permission to open private universities and colleges, the education minister has said.
"We have received 52 applications and we will look into them. Our main concern will be the full compliance with the rules and regulations to ensure there is no repeat of the issues we had to face earlier," Majed Al Nuaimi said on Monday.
"We will not allow any form of trafficking at the expense of students and standards," the minister told the upper chamber as its members convened for the last time in the 2006-2010 parliamentary term.
The ministry has taken punitive action against several of the country's 17 private universities and colleges for flouting rules and allowing students to graduate despite gross academic and administrative deficiencies.
Private colleges and universities mushroomed in Bahrain, mainly in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks on the US and the emergence of a tense climate that made several Arabs and Muslims reconsider their education options and decide to remain in the Gulf.
However, several of the higher education institutions have failed to fully comply with the rules set by the Bahraini authorities and allowed students to graduate on easy terms. Kuwait's education minister ordered an investigation before deciding to stop recognising Bahraini degrees.
The Higher Education Council in 2009 launched a campaign to address the situation and eventually named and shamed the colleges that failed to comply with the rules and elevate their academic and management standards.
"When we published the names and irregularities in the universities, we simply wanted parents and students to have the right to assess what is happening," Al Nuaimi told the parliament. "We will not hesitate to publish the name of any university that fails to reach the required standard in any of the areas under our scrutiny," said Al Nuaimi, the former president of the University of Bahrain.
