Syllabus for revival

In a makeshift university classroom in northern Iraq, from the back of the class, Kosar Osman voices what would be a radical goal in the Middle East — a meritocracy.

“Now, if you don't have a relative somewhere, you won't get hired,'' says the student at the American University of Iraq-Sulaimani (AUIS).

“When we graduate, we're going to have a lot of talent and ... qualifications. ... [Iraq needs] people who really serve their country, not just themselves and their families.''

In a region of authoritarian teachers and governments, the one-year-old AUIS is trying to reinvent university education and produce independent-minded graduates who can help rebuild Iraq in the process.

“The whole of their high school training has been people standing up in front of the room lecturing to them,'' says provost Joshua Mitchell, who is on leave from Georgetown University in Washington DC.

“They think they're supposed to sit there quietly and listen. We're teaching them in this first year ... substance in their coursework but we're also teaching them how to be a new kind of student.''

Most of the students have never written an essay or worked with computers. But they seem to be absorbing the lessons.

“If people want to stay here and help Iraq everything has to be changed,'' says Dea Dlawar, sitting at her desk. She says she wants to go into politics.

In Iraq, as in other parts of the Middle East, the brightest high school students are channelled into engineering and medicine.

The country is awash in natural resources but has a severe shortage of managers and technocrats.

Mitchell, who helped start a school of foreign service in Qatar, says the private university is aimed at producing graduates who will be indispensable to government ministries and be socially responsible entrepreneurs.

“People look at America and they say it's casino capitalism, it's rampant individualism. But the point is, America has survived for the past two or three hundred years because it has ... [not only] self-interest but also a deep commitment to community service,'' Mitchell says.

“We are focusing on areas critical to Iraq's future,'' says Deputy Prime Minister Barham Salih, the university's founder.

“Management, IT — you have too many engineering faculties but don't have a good-quality business school; you don't have a quality IT school.''

Two hundred and fifty-six students are enrolled, about 20 of them in an MBA programme. The rest are pursuing undergraduate degrees.

Most are Kurdish but some are Iraqi Arab and Turkmen. Mitchell says the university is operating on a shoestring budget.

If they can raise the money, officials hope to start more programmes.

Salih says they also plan to launch a research centre “in the truest sense of an American institution — free thought and genuine research in issues of Islam, Arab democracy and federalism.

'' But with a student body that Mitchell says has grown up with no political vocabulary, they are starting with the basics.

"Salih, who is British-educated, says that free thinkers are key to a free society. But “reforming the state education system is not easy — you cannot easily reform it from within.

"You have to create models that can be emulated,'' he says, looking out over the site of a new campus that hopes to accommodate 1,000 students in the next four years.

The students look as if they could be from almost anywhere. On the bulletin board at the temporary campus, there are notices for women's basketball, a drama club meeting and volunteer opportunities.

During break, students sit on the building steps in the winter sun — boys on mobile phones, girls in jeans sitting with girls in headscarves. In an improvised cafeteria, students eat pizza from cardboard boxes.

Instructor Peter Friedrich says he was teaching in an inner-city Los Angeles school when he read about AUIS.

“There's a lot more in common than some people might imagine with teaching here,'' he says. “The pure devotion of the student body.''

The school has 15 faculty members. “Everyone has a story,'' says Mitchell, whose own story includes being born in Egypt and a stint as a professional country-and-Western singer before finding his calling in teaching.

Many of the students believe they are doing more than getting a good education.

“It's a way of helping my country,'' says Mohammad Ahmad, who, at 23, is one of the oldest in the class and one of about ten students from the south of Iraq.

At $10,000 per year, few Iraqis can afford the tuition. But almost all the students are on full scholarships or sponsorships by community and business leaders.

Many come from modest backgrounds. “We don't want this to be an elitist institution just for the boys and girls of the rich,'' Salih says.