FLASH
Shkruar nga Ben Blushi
Very soon, Albanian families will be faced with a huge dilemma: Why does my child need a diploma?
Almost a year ago I was invited to a conversation with students of language and literature at the University of Korça. There were no more than 12 students. Twenty years ago, there were several hundred boys and girls studying in that branch who believed that a degree could secure you a good job. But today this is no longer true. Not everyone is convinced that a university degree is enough to secure you a job. And the question for many families is, is it worth sending your child to higher education? Does every branch and every school return the money invested in education? I'm afraid not.
Conditioned by social complexes, families save to send their children to higher education, but this money that could be invested elsewhere, in the vast majority of cases, never comes back. Fortunately, many parents are realizing this. Very soon, people will start giving up on diplomas. Having a diploma does not mean that you have a guaranteed job, or a well-paid job. In the Albanian market, a plumber earns more than a lawyer. An electrician earns more than a teacher. A cook earns more than a biologist. A real estate agent earns more than an economist.
A builder with a brigade of ten people earns more than an architect. If a family needs at least 50 thousand euros in four years to keep a child in university, to educate an electrician it takes ten times less and the possibility that he will return the investment is much faster. In general, education all over the world is in crisis and in less than a decade technological advances will not only close many jobs but will also close the laboratories that prepare people for work: the university itself. Albania will be no exception.
If in the next ten years an ultra-left government does not come to power, taking money from taxes to alleviate social dramas, most universities will close. They say that private universities are a little better. As long as they remain open, they should be a little better. However, very soon they will also shrivel up as they have shrivel up. The first choice of Albanian children today is foreign universities, the second choice is private ones and the third choice is public universities. But very soon Albanian families will be faced with a very big dilemma: Why does my child need a diploma?
I myself, if I were to go back 40 years ago, of course I would not choose the branch I chose, language and literature, which taught me nothing, but perhaps I would not choose to go to University at all. Life has taught me more things than school. Work has taught me that school does not teach you to work. Most people who graduated from school in the late 1990s never used their diplomas. They did other jobs that they could do without a diploma. Today you can live much better by investing the costs of education elsewhere, in a start-up or in a family business or in tourism or in agriculture. So how is the university crisis solved? I believe that no reform that does not expand the market is enough. Albania's integration into the EU will destroy our universities even worse. As an EU member state, Albanian children can study for free in any European country, which means that the costs that a family pays today to send their son or daughter to Germany will be half as much. This will take the last bite out of our public and private universities. Albania will have its children's education guaranteed, but it will risk the closure of its universities.
Whenever I talk to friends who run private universities, I tell them that the only way they can keep their businesses open is to open their markets to foreigners. Our universities are the most isolated part of society. Even the poorest football teams have foreigners, not to mention restaurants, services, banks or companies. Surprisingly, universities look like pure ethnic laboratories. There are only Albanians who don't study there. Of course, Albania cannot attract German, Belgian, Slovenian or maybe Turkish students. But given its geographical location, climate and low cost of living, Albania could become a free European hub for thousands of Chinese, Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Iraqi, Egyptian, Vietnamese etc. students.
All of these countries send more than 200 million students to university every year. Maybe even more. In all of these countries, which have half the world's population, nearly 4 billion people, the middle class is growing rapidly. More and more people are emerging from poverty in China, India, Egypt, Nigeria, and Vietnam, where the economy is booming. This means that in the next ten or twenty years, families will send even more children to higher education.
But so many children from middle-class Chinese, Indian and Pakistani families who dream of studying in Europe cannot go to London, Paris or Berlin or America, which is closing as a university market. In addition to isolationist policies in these countries, the costs are much higher and the quotas are very limited. But some of them could come to Albania, as in a European country. I am amazed at how private universities still spend money on advertising in the small Albanian market, when they should be opening recruitment agencies in China, India or Pakistan or Egypt. This should be a national business. State-aided. State-led.
The government could explore these markets first to fill the public universities that are currently dying. It is better for our universities to be maintained with the money of the Chinese and Indians than with our taxes. Of the 200 million Asian students who go to higher education every year, even 0.1 percent would come to Albania, which is twice the total number of Albanian students. The state could turn into an agency to collect students from other countries through bilateral agreements.
Imagine if the University of Korça, which is dying, were a destination for Chinese students. The University of Gjirokastës for Vietnamese, Vlora for Egyptians, who by the way are keeping our fishing industry afloat today, or Elbasan for Indians. This educational migration not only revitalizes universities but can turn into an economy for our small cities themselves. That is why I say that if we want a University, we must find students, because although there are teachers, there will always be fewer and fewer students.
Lini një Përgjigje