Achievements and Aspirations

The progress of any nation entirely depends on the extent it achieves in building and developing its human resources. Higher education represents one of the most important means of developing human resources, which in turn is considered a strategic investment for any country. Through higher education programs, every nation manages to fulfill its needs of knowledgeable and skilled labor forces which labor market needs and which its national development requires. Higher education globally witnesses many of the changes, transformations and challenges imposed by the technical and information developments of the contemporary civilization.
The real challenge facing the institutions of university higher education today is embodied in the development of knowledge economies, which represent "An economy directly based on the production, dissemination and use of knowledge and information in various production and service activities,". To achieve this goal, the ministry has sought to direct the Saudi system of higher education towards real partnerships with the labor sector, where universities become research centers for knowledge production through developing programs and their methods to provide today's students with the necessary knowledge and skills that would enable them to involve into the labor market based on the economics of knowledge.
In Saudi Arabia, higher education has scored remarkable leaps both in quality and quantity. These leaps have drawn the  attention of  those interested in higher education affairs in various countries of the world. In this run, the Ministry of Higher Education has adopted radical changes which in turn led to a new restructuring of the universities in our dear  country to adapt with the orientations of the Saudi and the international labor markets. This reconstructing is achieved across a wide range of programs and procedures, short-, medium-and long-term plans to include a number of pivots. The most notable among these pivots are mainly seven which include: the acceptance and assimilation, harmonization, quality, finance, scientific research, scholarships and finally strategic planning.
Actually, the ministry and the universities started to deal with the issue of quality from two important dimensions: firstly, raising the internal efficiency of universities by ensuring the quality of university education inputs, which was achieved by the establishment of the National Center for Assessment in Higher Education in 1421 AH. Secondly, raising the external efficiency of universities by adjusting the outputs and verifying their quality and achieving the academic and  the institutional accreditation of the universities. To achieve this goal, The National Commission for Assessment and Academic Accreditation ( NCAAA) was established in 1424 AH to be responsible for academic accreditation and quality assurance in higher education institutions.
In the context of supporting the efforts of the universities and the institutions of higher education programs to reach advanced levels, the ministry has taken a number of qualitative initiatives aimed at raising the level of quality in universities which are represented in the three major projects. The first is the project of developing the creativity and the excellence of the faculty members. The second one is supporting the establishment of centers for research and scientific excellence in universities, in addition to what is approved in their budgets. The third project is to contribute with universities in supporting scientific societies.
To diversify the sources of knowledge in the preparation of human resources, the scholarship program of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques came to reinforce this goal.  The State has assigned more than seven billion riyals for the scholarships of the prestigious universities in a number of developed countries over the range of five years. Since scientific research is complementary to the educational activity and is considered an important tributary in the universities as a pillar of development and progress in all fields of science, and as a means of enhancing the concepts of the best knowledge economy, the ministry has sought to strengthen the role of universities in the service of scientific research through the development of scientific research centers. Among the forms of this development comes the development of science parks, technology parks and their incubators, including Dhahran Techno Valley, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, “ Kasb Program” at King Saud University and The Advanced Scientific Park Project at King Abdulaziz University.
In order to continue the development of the Saudi system of higher education, the ministry has initiated the preparation of a strategic plan for the future of higher education over the following twenty-five years, a plan  which adopted the name of (Horizons Project).
These great developments in higher education in Saudi Arabia have reflected the noble patronage and the great interest of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, the Crown Prince and the prudent Saudi Government.

Source:

Introduction to His Excellency The Minister of Higher Education Dr. Khalid bin Mohammad Al-Anqari. Quoted from (Higher Education in Saudi Arabia, Summary Report 1428 AH)