The American International School of Algiers

[HoHey]

http://www.aisalgiers.org/

[shadok]

30.000 $ / an ce n’est pas donné pour une école de niveau primaire. Ça restera une école pour enfants de riches.

A quand de grandes écoles (universités) américaines ?

[HoHey]

30.000 $ / an ce n’est pas donné pour une école de niveau primaire. Ça restera une école pour enfants de riches.

C'est vrai, mais je pense que cette ecole est surtout destinee pour les enfants des expats travaillant pour des compagnies etrangeres qui peuvent offrir des packages incluant les frais de scolarisation pour les enfants de leurs employes. Un debut a encourager quand meme.

A quand de grandes écoles (universités) américaines ?

Pour cela, il faut etre visionnaire. Et, quite frankly, on peut pas etre visionnaire lorsqu’on est trabandiste notoire, anglophobe, collectionneur d'appartements de luxe Parisiens, et mangeur avide du merguez au hrissa de Barbes. It ain't going to work, trust me.

Vision is something close to what the UAE is doing. Many American universities are established there and the serious cash the UAE are spending is put to good use and will bear fruit, I would think. Quality education and the good command of the English language are the future, and there is no way around that.

Here goes New York University (NYU) - Abu Dhabi graduation tribute for the class of 2016.

[perplexe]

Hi HoHey,
Having lived in Abu Dhabi for a while, we considered New York university in Abu Dhabi as being the top choice if you can afford It… premises are impressive as about everything recent in the UAE. Seems quite selective (3% of applicant are successful ?). Students seem to work seriously and job opportunities used to be plenty locally. Even better if you know Arabic.
Sorbonne university is in AD too but the choice of classes is quite limited especially in sciences.
So far no competition for Stanford yet....

[HoHey]

Hi perplexe,

Yea, Stanford is top-tier school, no doubt...

You see, what eats away at me is that we missed a golden opportunity for true reforms. We could have done better than the UAE or any other Sheikdom in the Arabian Gulf if Algerian officials had had vision to introduce serious reforms to higher education in the past 15 years or so.

To put things in perspective a bit, a figure of $700 billion has been floated around as our total revenue from selling oil since the early 2000's. Marshall's plan money in today's dollar amounts to about $120 billion, and with that money, the US helped rebuild a devastated Western Europe after WWII (about 16 nations received help). And things worked out rather well.

How is our education today? And how is our economy? If billions were spent to reform education or improve the economy, successive governments would have tragically very little to show for it.

[Capo]

I saw the video .. the school director is a money grabber oeilfermé

[HoHey]

the school director is a money grabber

Don't think so. Tuition is comparable to other similar schools in the region. I know for a fact that a good English-American elementary school in Abu Dhabi charges $25,000 a year per child.

[Bachi]

Qu'a-t-on besoin des écoles américaines pour avoir la qualité?
ces trucs de tiers-monde vont nous poursuivre éternellement.

[HoHey]

Qu'a-t-on besoin des écoles américaines pour avoir la qualité?
ces trucs de tiers-monde vont nous poursuivre éternellement

The best way to strike up a conversation with about anyone after coming back from vacation:

1- Ask a difficult question
2- Answer it right away
3- High-five yourself
4- hehehe (optional)

Welcome back!

[Bachi]

Hola, sir...

Gracias senor...

[Galaad]

C'est destiné en priorité aux enfants d'Américains et les expats anglophones, notamment le corps diplomatique et les employés de l'Ambassade.

[perplexe]

Hello HoHey,
I agree with Bachi that Algeria is not to rely to 3rd world countries solutions (though we may argue that this qualification indeed applies to UAE) as Algeria can readily benefit from a large pool of high educated citizen and professors.
But with a lack of political initiative nothing can happen.
In addition, today's ranking of high schools is largely dependent on ties with the industrial and research activities, at least in technical fields. This is another weak point for Algeria.
Thirdly, in order to attract international students who will further enlarge the footprint of the university the living conditions shall be as good as other countries can propose.
With some money spent, all that can be achieved possibly through joint effort with already well established international universities. Just a matter of priority.
To fill up your Swiss bank account or the brain of your young generation, that is the question.
Cheers

[HoHey]

Hi perplexe,

Thanks for your insight.

Go to your nearest ATM machine inside a shopping mall or a bank in Abu Dhabi and swipe or insert your credit/debit card to get cash. It would work and you would get your cash. Run the same experiment at your nearest ATM machine in Biskra, Algiers or Oran. If the ATM machine is there, your credit/debit card won't work and you would be lucky if you got your card back after having inserted it (I highly advise against trying that at Algerie Poste).

We can run the same experiment with many other aspects of modern life and the outcome would probably be the same. Compare online banking, modern bureaucracy, broadband internet, the airline industry, healthcare and so forth.

UAE, in my book, is arguably not a Third World country, but Algeria most definitely is.

Look, the UAE leadership had vision and decided they could subsidize the presence of Western universities in their own country and that that model would work for them. They are doing what they think would serve best their educational needs. I found that admirable. Is that a sustainable model? I don't know, but that's for them to decide.

That's not what I'm necessarily recommending we do, though, and I'm well aware that there are no one-size-fits-all kind of solutions. What I believe we urgently need now is reforms, true reforms, so our schools become competitive and well equipped to provide world class education. And we need to figure out how to best do that.

Our college graduates are mostly an embarrassing display of what our schools are producing. They are poorly trained and unmarketable. And, frankly, outside French-speaking Timbuktu, N'Djamena or Nouakchott, they can't compete in the international job market.

That's not sustainable and we must change course. Quickly.

Apart from money laundering in leaderless Algeria, Algerian officials, visionless and undereducated, are not doing much. With $700 or $800 billion in revenue from selling oil in past 15 or 20 years, we could have not only reformed our entire education system, but we could have also rebooted the entire country and started anew. But we didn't. We blew it. Sadly. And that hurts like hell.

Cheers.

[shadok]

@HoHey, perplexe

Tkhawfou fina

[perplexe]

Hi HoHey

You' re welcome.

A quick break during my vacations to answer to you.
Surely agree with what is needed and frustration that comes with it.
Let's hope for a miracle. May be 10 years with a Brent at 20 USD would shake the tree one way or the other.

Cheers