A long-awaited draft law organising university affairs will be finalised in the next few weeks. Reem Leila sifts through the main articles The Consultative Committee of Universities has finalised a draft law organising the work of these higher institutions of learning. The draft consists of 15 articles focussing on improving and amending laws and legislation of all of Egypt's universities. The committee has already sent copies of the draft to Egypt's 18 universities for approval. A final copy will then be sent to the Cabinet and parliament for approval during its current session and to be applied by the beginning of the new academic year 2012/13. More than 6,000 university professors and assisting staff will benefit from the upcoming draft. Independence of universities, increasing the scientific research budget and providing a decent living for staff members are among its main features. In the draft, university academic staff will help amend university legislations, evaluate the performance of universities and draw up future plans for improvement. The draft will also put in place several regulations to guarantee a high standard of teaching staff. Until the 1950s, Egyptian universities were competing with international universities. Their professors were producing academic research equivalent to those of their contemporaries. Starting from the 1960s Egypt's universities noticeably declined regarding educational standard and research produced. Among the reasons for the drop was ironically the increase in the number of universities, from just four to 18. This led to a decrease in the number of qualified professors especially in universities in remote areas. University professor Adel Abdel-Gawad, head of the consultative committee which prepared the draft, said improving scientific and academic standards of universities' teaching staff is a must as stated in the new draft. "There will be a scientific committee in each faculty for evaluating scientific and academic performance for each member of the teaching staff. Accordingly, each university professor must work on improving his academic level or he will be deprived of several financial privileges," stated Abdel-Gawad. The draft outlines a new organisational ladder for universities. On top is the Ministry of Higher Education, followed by the newly created Supreme Council for Higher Education. What follows is the Supreme Council for Universities, then the Faculties Council, and ending with departments councils. The Ministry of Higher Education along with the Supreme Council for Higher Education will be concerned with drawing up strategies and plans for improving the overall process of education among universities. "This will guarantee the independence of universities because the Supreme Council for Higher Education will join the ministry in setting up plans for universities. This will end the old era of just being an affiliated entity to the ministry which must obey and implement its orders without objecting," Abdel-Gawad said. Wages of public universities professors have been a source of friction for years. Since 2007, university professors have been demanding an overhaul of their salaries and to equate them with their peers, the judges. The new draft has solved the problem. Salaries of university professors have been increased, on condition that university professors do not work anywhere else except for their university. According to Abdel-Gawad, professor salaries are inappropriate with their qualifications. "Finally the government has stopped its evasiveness. Their promises turned out to be true, but we are still waiting to see when it will truly come into force," Abdel-Gawad stated. Salaries of university professors according to the draft will be LE3,750 a month for lecturers instead of LE1,500, LE17,450 for assistant professors instead of the current LE2,000 and LE25,500 for full-time professors instead of the present paltry LE3,000. "After the new criteria of salaries, university professors will be at last equated with judges. Currently, judges' salaries are more than three-fold that of university professors. This was unfair. Why should we lead a difficult life while we are as highly qualified as judges," he said. The budget allocated for scientific research was not thoroughly reviewed in the new draft. For the past decade, university professors have been criticising the scientific research budget as "peanuts". Awatef Abdel-Rahman, professor at the Faculty of Mass Communication in Cairo University said that 10 years ago the budget allocated for national security was three times the money for scientific research. "Three years ago, the security budget increased 10 times more than the scientific research budget. To politicians, security is considered their safety valve, however, science and education is the entire country's safety valve," Abdel-Rahman said. The current amount of money allocated for scientific research does not exceed 0.4 per cent. The scientific research budget, according to the draft, should be increased in the next three years. "The current budget is LE3 billion. In the first year, the fiscal year of 2013, the budget should increase to LE6 billion. In 2014 it could be raised to LE9 billion, then LE13 billion the last year. After the increases, it will comprise only 2.5 per cent of the country's general budget, Abdel-Rahman said. Abdel-Rahman refused to provide further details because the draft is still being studied by universities.
