Researcher Shatha Khalil *
Translated by : mudhaffar al-kusairi
The foundation of building countries and civilizations, and the welfare, economy, power and politics, all of which lies in education, especially primary education, if we want to reform the society we have to nurture a generation of science , awareness , culture , patriotism , and ready to sacrifice for the sake of homeland to form a power that enables it to overcome difficulties and suffering and save our country from what it is, and there is no factory for this generation better than school.
In a hot and painful atmosphere, the Rawabet Center for Research and Strategic Studies conducted an investigation into the reasons for the low level of education in Iraq, the answer came from within the teaching community of several teachers and school principals , the low level is due to the misguided policies of successive governments that followed the US occupation of Iraq in 2003 and its impacts which had destroyed the generations of students, and the direct and indirect effects on the student’s psychology of deprivation , killing and kidnapping . All these factors weakened the scientific and creative abilities of the students, not to mention weak educational performance and forms of corruption which played a major role in the destruction of the education in Iraq where it was the capital of culture and science, and a popular destination for science students from all over the world.
However, during the past 14 years, after the US invasion of Mesopotamia, the destruction of some customs and traditions in Iraqi society, and the negative impact on some Iraqi youth of the reluctance to education and work, because of poverty and low wages, all these factors and others led to the low level of education in the country of civilizations, noting that teachers, and university professors are the most ones who are suffering from these problems , and this illustrates the collapse of the education system in Iraq, and according to teachers Rawabet Center identified the most important reasons behind the deterioration of education in Iraq as follows :
– Because of the wrong policies of the successive governments that followed the US occupation of Iraq in 2003, continuing wars and political conflicts, which have greatly affected the scientific level.
-The control of religious parties and militias loyal to it on all parts of the state.
– Education in Iraq faces great challenges, most notably the change of curricula, the domination of religious parties in some schools, as well as the destruction of thousands of them as a result of the ongoing battles against the terrorist organization ISIS who destroyed all aspects of civilization and education.
– continuing aggression on educational and teaching staff day after day , and this is a dangerous turn in the course of education, when the level reaches the level of insult and the teacher or professor keeps silent, and can not respond to the attack legally, because this cost him his life and the life of one of his family, an Iraq became as a forest, living for the strong in all spheres of life (political, economic, health or even religious spheres ).
-The disrespect of the student to his teacher at various levels of education in Iraqi schools and universities, has become common and familiar to many students and young people, as the surpass the methods of abuse, and begin to disrespect and using the worst words during the talk or debate on a particular issue , and it comes to hit the teacher or professor in front of the eyes of the people, and there are professors who are threatened to be killed for one reason or another, and there is the explosion of his home, and sometimes misunderstanding led the student to commit the most terrible crimes against his teacher .
– After 2006, religious education dominated on the curriculum in Iraq, where the link between the practical and educational curricula in religion has become an inevitable link in all issues received by students in schools through the establishment of schools for Shiite and Sunni endowments, and set a curriculum according to the school sect and tendencies of students and the staff of it.
-The corruption in Iraq over the past years did not exclude education in Iraq. According to a source in the Planning Department of the Iraqi Ministry of Education, millions of dollars were allocated under the former Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to build and establish schools throughout the country, but only 10% of them have been completed .
– Lack of schools, and that the Iraqi Ministry of Education has submitted several proposals to the government, including the evacuation of government buildings seized by parties and militias and turned to headquarters and offices, which can be converted to schools to help solve the problem of lack, which stopped the wheel of development and education in Iraq, it did not receive a listening ear.
– In light of this shortage of schools and the increasing number of students in Iraq, the ministry has been forced to merge some schools, making the classrooms overcrowded to the point of suffocation, indicating that there are classes of more than 70 students, which makes the lesson useless for students.
-The sources added that more than 5300 schools were destroyed or damaged as a result of the military actions, distributed in several areas are still not eligible to receive students, which made the task of the Ministry of Education to contain all students more difficult, as well as the fiscal deficit in the state budget, in addition to the deliberate mismanagement by the responsible parties as a result of the influence of the parties and sectarian militias.
On the suffering of students, student Esraa Ali said: “We students suffer a lot of curriculum changes frequently every year, so we do not absorb the material, because the curriculum is not linked between the successive stages, because it is in constant change. And the student Zena Haider said , often the curriculums are distributed on students late, and sometimes before the end of the first semester of the year.
Cheating in Education :
The process of cheating is systematic and large in most stages of education, resulting in a failed generation that destroys, does not build, does not know the most basic duties in institutional work or craft work, and everyone here hopes to change the situation to the best, away from cheating and violence against the teachers., and teachers hope for a better situation so that the teacher and the university professor can achieve his goals in education to build a conscious and responsible generation! But…
Not only the student cheats, and the cheating in the educational system in Iraq after the US occupation reaches to the professor and the teacher himself, some teachers and professors in different schools and universities to leak test questions for a certain price.
Massacre to destroy the Arabic language in Iraq:
One of the effects mentioned is the impact on the safety of Arabic language and one of most important reasons for the destruction of education in Iraq is the massacre of the Arabic language in Iraq. According to specialists, the “massacre of the Arabic language” in Iraq continues unless the competent institutions take note of two things, first to reform the teaching curricula consistent with the modern use of the language, and the second element is to engage the teaching elements to an intensive courses to enable them to absorb the material and present it to the student in accordance with modern teaching methods creating a positive relationship between the student and the material, and these two elements need to change the administrators of those educational institutions that are part of the sectarian allocation in Iraq, and this in turn needs to change the political system as a whole.
Some of the professors say that spelling and grammatical errors in the exam questions have become a subject of ridicule, a sign of the level of education in Iraq.
He who has created elegance in all languages, especially created beauty and it’s secrets in the language of Dad (Arabic). This is how the Egyptian poet Ahmad Shawki described the Arabic language praising Arabic language. As Baghdad was the civilized capital of the world and became the worst capital in the world, so Arabic language suffers in a country that was the basis of language in history.
Iraqi politicians do not master the Arabic language, while university youth can not even write a clear line at a time when the mass media used the popular colloquial dialects in exaggerated forms.
Since the US occupation of Iraq, the Arabic language has been steadily declining at various levels.
Conclusion:
Education in Iraq this year faces great challenges and foreshadowing its collapse unless an urgent plan is put in place to contain all students. Here, we present some points that we believe contribute to the building of education to be included in our future plans to save Iraq from ignorance and backwardness.
Building new schools to solve the problem of the bottlenecks in the trigeminal and bilateral school hours and eliminate mud schools and caravans, and prepare new classrooms to reduce the number of students in one classroom so that the teacher can perform his task properly and the students be able to understand the lessons and the teacher manages to control the lesson and complete the curriculum as scheduled, and develop scientific curricula taking into account ages, abilities in an innovative way , and the development of teaching methods, in line with the rapid developments taking place in the world through films , educational and illustrative means, and the presentation through television screens, to design films for each category, especially the primary classes or and a special room for display should be there and to raise the salaries of teachers in order to motivate them to exert efforts in delivering the idea and information to the students, and to take care of this segment and support it in all fields materially and morally, and take care of school buildings, classrooms, furniture, health facilities and other building supplies , and adopt the law of granting 30 thousand dinars for each pupil of primary school during the study, because of the positive impact in providing the requirements of the study, and motivates the parents to send their children for the education, especially poor families, and work on continuous cooperation between the family and the school in follow-up the level of the student Scientifically and educationally , as well as interest in providing school counselors in all schools due to the importance of the psychological side of the students.
Economic Studies Unit
Rawabet Center for Research and Strategic Studies