Knowledge authority seeks to control school funding in Dubai

Dubai: Little can be done to reform public schools in Dubai unless the KHDA (Knowledge and Human Development Authority) has control over federal funds, Dr Abdullah Al Karam, Chairman, Board of Directors and Director General of KHDA said on Tuesday.

"The biggest challenge is that we can do little to improve the lot of government schools. We have done only a fraction of what we can actually do. The minute we are made responsible financially, and funds for public schools are transferred to the KHDA, you will see big changes," Al Karam told Gulf News.

Lamenting the poor standards in state schools, KHDA's top boss maintained that the federal budget allocated to education is not utilised properly.

"The government spends an average of Dh20,000 per student in our public schools and 23 per cent of the federal budget is allocated to education. You see all of it and then compare the output, that is when I feel I wish I could do a lot more," said Al Karam.

In the last academic year, when KHDA conducted the first-of-its-kind inspections for both public and private schools, none of the state schools fell in the top performance category.

The Dubai Schools Inspection Bureau's annual report had also pointed out several shortcomings in the functioning of state schools, including poor management, weak curriculums, outdated teaching methodologies and poor parental engagement.

The findings also exposed the prevalence of physical and verbal abuse of students by teachers.

The bureau recommended that the Ministry of Education should give public schools more control over management and deployment of teachers and resources.

Limited power

Though the KHDA oversees the functioning of government and private schools in Dubai, and can make recommendations to the federal ministry, all policy decisions regarding recruitment of teachers, examinations, curriculum, allocation of resources etc. in public schools come under the Ministry's purview.

When the KHDA was established in 2006 under the directives of His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to develop the education and human resource sectors in the emirate, the agreement with the Ministry was that it will continue to extend the same support that the education zone (the former state body) was offering.

However, Al Karam insisted that unless there is more clarity on the administrative and financial powers of the KHDA, he won't go any further to initiate policy recommendations in public schools.

"If the part of federal budget for Dubai schools is transferred to KHDA, the Ministry can hold us accountable in that we promise better results. I believe it is a fair argument. But the ultimate decision lies with the ministry and we are quite positive about it," he added.

The Minister of Education was not available for comment.