Job Discussion Forums

[veiledsentiments]

I'd say that 'primarily' they are a teaching institution. But, I suspect that research sources from individual professors who are interested rather than policy. This is basically a women's college - from which the majority of graduates will marry and enter the hareem. Only a tiny minority will go on to get advanced degrees and few will actually enter the workplace.

VS

[erma]

Hi Walt,

yes, I've researched ZU website. But I'm always wary about the way in which educational institutions represent themselves (there is always a lot of pompous and self-flattering chest beating). I wanted to hear from people who are or were there.

Veiled sentiments, there is nothing veiled about your words here. I don't know about joining harem, but I assume that these girls will have more opportunities in future. Times are a-changin'...

But yes, it could be a problem if these girls know they won't be able to work, then why work hard in the university, right? But, let's be optimistic. From my own experience, women in the Muslim world tend to be more hard-working than men...

[Afra]

Sorry - I didn't mean to imply that US citizens are unaffected by currency fluctuations. However, if you are sending money out of the UAE, it's become more expensive for non-US folks.

[veiledsentiments]

Erma

Good description of the ZU website... you are very right to be wary. Pompous is the perfect word.

You will soon enough learn the reality of what I have said. Times are not changing all that fast. Those of us with years of experience playing this game know that with any luck the daughters and/or granddaughters of these fascinating young women will get some real opportunities.

And yes, the women are certainly more hard-working and almost always much better students. The girls I taught in the Emirates worked unbelievably hard to stay in the colleges because if they failed, it was to disappear behind the doors of their father's or husband's home. When I was there, about 10% of a particular year's entrance students eventually graduated and only about a quarter of those entered the workplace. Those numbers have risen in the last 10 years, but not much.

That said, everyone plays the game. The students work hard and pretend that they will get to actually use their degrees and the teachers pretend that we believe them. And I enjoyed every minute of teaching them.

VS

[Gordon]

[veiledsentiments]

[erma]

VS,

that's one of the most interesting and revealing responses i've seen. it says a lot about pre-conceived notions that people in different cultures have about those from other cultures. your last sentence sums up the issue perfectly. i wish all of us had such sensitivity.

Erma

[whatgoesaround]

[younggeorge]

[younggeorge]

[veiledsentiments]

Goodness younggeorge, feel free to 'disagree.' But, you weren't really disagreeing on the research issue as much as updating. We almost NEVER get a ZU teacher who posts here, so I can only pass on what friends teaching there have told me. And since all my friends are in English, they perhaps don't pay much attention to what the professors are doing.

I'm not sure why you consider the 'hareem' reference to be condescending. It is the Arabic term for the area of the house that is restricted to women only. It is certainly the term that they would use. It is only some Westerners who have a negative connotation to that word. The average Emirati family is still very conservative. When I first taught at HCT in the early 90's, out of an entry class of 185, only about 12 would make it to graduation, and of those 1 or less would make it to the workplace. In the last 10 years, the number of students, graduates and those entering the work force has increased - once could even say dramatically. You will find a larger percentage of women moving into the workforce now in Dubai, but the number in the rest of the country is still very small. We can all point to a few outstanding young women who have managed to become successful. But, my many friends teaching women in the Emirates still bemoan how it is often their best students whose family have said 'no' to their working. Perhaps they will have more liberal husbands.

Insha'Allah...

VS

[younggeorge]

[usool]

Hi all

How sad that people view leaving the house and getting a job as 'progess' and the opposite as backward. This is typical of western 'braindead' syndrome. Western women did not leave the house for emancipatory reasons, it was pure economics. Recent reports in the UK suggest more and more young women are choosing the rewarding career of bringing up children to being a *beep* to the economy(http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1434152,00.html) in some underpaid, part-time, over-worked job (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1433206,00.html). As for the comments that we Muslims pitty western women for the shallow and immature reasons outlined by veiledshadow, you're having a laugh. I grew up in the UK and in studies and work I can't ever recall a western man referrring a woman in anything other than a sexual way, it's one of the reasons that turned me off you're great way of life. Women in the west are nothing more than sexual objects, thats why you see them in advertisements for everything from soap to sofas, because in reality the executives view them as just one more studio prop.

Regards and best wishes

[usool]

Women in their late 20s polled across the UK made clear that, after watching their exhausted mothers trying against the odds to balance work and home life, they are not prepared to attempt the same juggling act. Instead, the survey indicates, those who grew up in the 1980s want to "downshift", working in jobs that interest rather than overwhelm them, and spending more time with their children than their parents did.


The group dubbed the "don't want it all" generation by New Woman magazine, which commissioned the poll, appears to be turning back to a more traditional social model in which men are the main breadwinners while women have prime responsibility for raising children.
Seven out of 10 of 1,500 women questioned in the Young Women's Lifestyle Survey of Great Britain 2005, with an average age 29, said they did not want to work as hard as their mother's generation. Once they had children - which most said they wanted to have from age 31 and within marriage - only one in 10 said she wanted to work full time and put their child into nursery care.

[younggeorge]