$Unique_ID{COW02153} $Pretitle{224} $Title{Lebanon Chapter 2D. Education} $Subtitle{} $Author{As'ad AbuKhalil} $Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army} $Subject{health lebanon private public beirut education schools university lebanese primary} $Date{1987} $Log{} Country: Lebanon Book: Lebanon, A Country Study Author: As'ad AbuKhalil Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army Date: 1987 Chapter 2D. Education The Lebanese, along with the Palestinians, had one of the highest literacy rates in the Arab world. The rate was estimated at nearly 80 percent in the mid-1980s, but like most other spheres of Lebanese life, communal and regional disparities existed. In general, Christians had a literacy rate twice that of Muslims. Druzes followed with a literacy rate just above that of Sunnis. Shias had the lowest literacy rate among the religious communities. The war adversely affected educational standards. Many private and public school buildings were occupied by displaced families, and the state was unable to conduct official examinations on several occasions because of intense fighting. Furthermore, the departure of most foreign teachers and professors, especially after 1984, contributed to the decline in the standards of academic institutions. Admissions of unqualified students became a standard practice as a result of pressures brought by various militias on academic institutions. More important, armed students reportedly often intimidated--and even killed--faculty members over disputes demanding undeserved higher grades. In the 1980s, there were three kinds of schools: public, private tuition-free, and private fee-based. Private tuition-free schools were available only at the preprimary and primary levels, and they were most often sponsored by philanthropic institutions. Many private fee-based schools were run by religious orders. Public schools were unevenly distributed among Lebanon's districts. The Beirut area had only 12.9 percent of the country's public schools, but a large number of Lebanon's private fee-based schools were concentrated in or near Greater Beirut (see table 2, Appendix A). Primary Education In 1987 five years of primary education was mandatory and available free to all Lebanese children. The curriculum of grades one through five was mostly academic, and Arabic was the major language of instruction. French and English were also major languages of instruction in private schools, although foreign languages were taught in public schools as well. No certification was awarded upon completion of the primary cycle. At the end of the fifth grade, the student qualified for admission to the four-year intermediate cycle or to the seven-year secondary cycle. Intermediate Education Intermediate education was a four-year cycle, consisting of grades six through nine for intermediate schools and one through four for vocational schools. Three different tracks were offered at this level: lower secondary was a four-year academic course designed to prepare the student for the baccalaureate examination; the upper primary track consisted of three years similar to lower secondary and a fourth year of preparation for entering vocational schools or teacher training institutes; and vocational study was a three-year practical course for less skilled trades. At the end of this cycle, students received an academic, technical, or professional certificate. Secondary Education Secondary education consisted of grades eleven through thirteen for academic programs or years one through three for vocational programs. Three tracks were available at this level. The secondary normal track consisted of three-year training programs for prospective primary and intermediate school teachers. A teaching diploma was awarded to students of teacher training schools who passed examinations at the end of the twelfth school year. The secondary vocational track prepared students for careers in such fields as business, commerce, tourism, hotel management, electronics, construction, advertising, nursing, telecommunications, automobile mechanics, and laboratory technology. Finally, the secondary academic track offered concentrations in philosophy (liberal arts curriculum), mathematics, and experimental sciences. The Baccalaureate I certificate was awarded to students who passed the official examination given at the end of the twelfth school year, and the Baccalaureate II was awarded to students who passed official examinations at the end of the thirteenth school year. The Baccalaureate II was necessary for admission to institutions of higher education in Lebanon. Many of the courses taken during the year were comparable to those at the college freshman level. Technical and Vocational Education In 1987 around 130 technical and vocational training institutes existed in Lebanon. Seventeen of these were state run, and the remaining 113 were private. Eighty-six of the private institutes were in the Greater Beirut area. Major public institutes included the Industrial Technical Institute, the Technical Institute for Tourism, and the Technical Teachers Institute. Higher Education In 1987 there were sixteen colleges and universities in Lebanon, and all but the Lebanese University were privately owned (see table 3, Appendix A). The Lebanese University, established in 1952, was under the Ministry of Education. It had two main branches--one in East Beirut and the other in West Beirut--and smaller branches in the provinces of Ash Shamal, Al Janub, and Al Biqa. University faculties (departments) included law, political science and management, engineering, literature and humanities, education, social sciences, fine arts, journalism and advertising, business administration, and agriculture. The language of instruction was Arabic, and one foreign language was required by all faculties. Beirut Arab University was established in 1960 and was officially an Egyptian-sponsored institution under the auspices of the Maqasid Society of Beirut. All affairs were controlled by Alexandria University in Egypt. Approximately 85 percent of the students enrolled at Beirut Arab University in the 1980s were non-Lebanese, coming primarily from Persian Gulf countries. Arabic was the primary language of instruction. St. Joseph's University, established in 1875, was administered by the Society of Jesus and had strong ties to the University of Lyons in France. St. Joseph's University had branches in Tripoli, Sidon, and Zahlah. French was the primary language of instruction, although some courses were offered in English. Faculties in 1987 included theology, medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, engineering, law and political science, economics and business administration, and letters and humanities. The American University of Beirut (AUB) was initially established in 1866 by the Evangelical Mission to Syria. In 1987 final authority over the affairs of AUB rested with the board of trustees, whose permanent office was in New York City. The university was incorporated under the laws of the state of New York. The faculty of arts and sciences awarded bachelor's and master's degrees; the faculty of medicine awarded bachelor's and master's degrees in science, master's degrees in public health, and certificates in undergraduate nursing and basic laboratory techniques; the faculty of engineering and architecture awarded bachelor's and master's degrees in engineering as well as bachelor's degrees in architecture; the faculty of agriculture and food sciences awarded master's degrees in all departments, as well as doctorates in agronomy. English was the language of instruction at AUB. Health Before 1975 Lebanon boasted advanced health services and medical institutions that made Beirut a health care center for the entire Middle East region. The war, however, caused enormous problems. Emergency medicine and the treatment of traumatic injury overwhelmed the health care sector during the 1975 Civil War. Indeed, the problems in health care continued into the 1980s. A World Health Organization study conducted in 1983 found that the private sector dominated health care services and that public sector health organizations were in chaos (see table 4, Appendix A). The weakened Ministry of Public Health maintained little coordination with other public sector health agencies, and over two-thirds of the ministry's budget (US $58.5 million in 1982) flowed to the private sector through inadequately monitored reimbursements for private hospital services. As of 1983, there were about 3.2 hospital beds (0.23 of them public) for every 1,000 persons, but control over the quality of hospital and medical services was minimal, and many public and private hospital beds were unoccupied. There was about 1 doctor for every 1,250 inhabitants, but nurses and middle-level technical personnel were scarce. Furthermore, health personnel were concentrated in Beirut, with minimum care available in many outlying areas. The Ministry of Public Health, as well as other government and private agencies, operated small clinics and dispensaries, but few such centers existed in Beirut. Nowhere in Lebanon was there a health center that delivered a full range of primary health care services. Although epidemiology is central to public health programs, the WHO delegation found that government health services in Lebanon lacked appropriate epidemiological reporting techniques. At the local or community level, health personnel, especially doctors, rarely reported diseases to the health department, although they were legally obliged to do so for some diseases. A similar situation existed with respect to health establishments such as clinics, dispensaries, and hospitals. Consequently, not only was there a conspicuous absence of health records but, where available, they were often incomplete. Because of the lack of adequate data, only cautious inferences based on partial data and observations and interviews by the WHO mission can be made concerning the incidence of disease. Respiratory infections and diarrheal diseases headed the list of causes of morbidity, and infectious diseases were endemic. Malnutrition was reported to be restricted to groups living in particularly difficult situations, such as the Palestinian and Lebanese refugees. Studies on the growth and illness patterns of Lebanese children, initiated in 1960, indicated a stable 5 to 10 percent of undernutrition (defined as low weight and height for age) in children under five. Various sources reported a high incidence of mental retardation among children, with cases occurring in clusters and seemingly related to consanguineous marriages in certain communities. * * * Rare are the books that are devoted exclusively to the study of Lebanese society. The small collection of such books includes Nura Alamuddin and Paul Starr's Crucial Bonds, Halim Barakat's Lebanon in Strife, Joseph Chamie's Religion and Fertility, Dominique Chevallier's La Societe du Mont Liban L'epoque de la Revolution Industrielle en Europe, Anne Fuller's Buarij: Portrait of a Lebanese Moslem Village, Samir Khalaf's Lebanon's Predicament and Persistence and Change in 19th Century Lebanon, Fuad I. Khuri's From Village to Suburb, Sami Nasib Makarem's The Druze Faith, Huda Zurayk and Haroutune Armenian's Beirut 1984: A Population and Health Profile. Salim Nasr and Claude Dubar's At Tabaqat al Ijtima'iyyah fi Lubnan (Social Classes in Lebanon), and Pierre Rondot's At Tawa'if fi ad Dawlah al Lubnaniyyah (Sects in the Lebanese State) are two valuable Arabic sources. Albert H. Hourani's Minorities in the Arab World is a classic treatment of this subject, and Robert C. Betts's Christians in the Arab East gives a useful account of Christian denominations. Also useful are some general works on Lebanon that contain relevant information. These include Helena Cobban's The Making of Modern Lebanon, David C. Gordon's Lebanon: The Fragmented Nation and The Republic of Lebanon, Albert H. Hourani's Syria and Lebanon, Michael C. Hudson's The Precarious Republic, and Kamal S. Salibi's The Modern History of Lebanon. (For further information and complete citations, see Bibliography.)