Lebanon’s higher education notices “free fall”

Deemed difficult, Lebanon’s university students are feeling the profound impact of the crisis.  

In a report, Times Higher Education outlined the Higher Education Research Group at the University of Edinburgh’s comments that some of Lebanon’s issues in higher education are led by the political instability and the rapid growth in private universities.  

Dr. Adnan El-Amine, professor of education at the Lebanese University, said that clientelism promoted an “uncompetitive” sector, which caused a decline in quality, even before the start of the crisis at the end of 2019.  

According to Times Higher Education, the “universities that were less digitalized found it harder to adapt to the distance learning enforced by the pandemic, while the economic crisis has led to a deterioration in universities’ financial resources and huge inflation.”  

Noting that living standards have led many faculty professors and members to leave the country and secure jobs elsewhere, Professor El-Amine stated that this has “impoverished” higher education academically in private institutions and the Lebanese University.  

Warning that students from neighboring countries who used to study in Lebanon because of the quality of its education now sending their students elsewhere or those countries developed their own universities. 

John Waterbury, former president of the American University of Beirut (AUB), said Lebanon was “probably the king of brain drain in the Middle East and has been for decades.”  

“The export of Lebanese talent is vital to sustaining the system, and it’s highly unlikely it’s going to maintain any more of its graduates today,” he stated.