Job Discussion Forums

[Sheikh N Bake]

Oh, puh-lease. Fine to have an academic option in the Gulf--but the hype! Sure--NYU Abu Dhabi and NYC to become Top Ten university by 2020. Fine--until history professors find out that the Holocaust never happened (by law), and then discover piecemeal the long list of haram topics, and admin starts hiring Egyptian deans as part of political correctness. (This will be a liberal arts campus, remember.)And admissions discover nobody outside the Middle East wants to come to Abu Dhabi except some US students who want to study Arabic so they can work for the CIA and FBI as translators.

I'm sure it will be a fine campus for as long as it lasts, but...the hype!

Another article quotes a higher-education expert: �In all of these models, there are trade-offs between credibility and risk,� he said during Tuesday's panel. �The tighter the relationship, the greater the potential risk to the reputation of the American or British institution that sponsors the campus.�

Without citing particular cases, Mr. Willoughby predicted that �we will see some failures of the branch-campus model.�




New York U. Says It Will Open a 'Comprehensive Liberal-Arts Campus' in Abu Dhabi
By Zvika Krieger

New York University announced on Friday that it will open a campus in Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates, joining a swarm of American universities hoping to capitalize on Persian Gulf money by opening branches in the oil-rich region. NYU's new project, which the university says will create "the first comprehensive liberal-arts campus abroad developed by a major U.S. research university," seems to be the most ambitious project to date in the region.

NYU, whose network of global campuses was missing a Middle East outpost, spoke with multiple countries in the region before being won over by Abu Dhabi's expansive vision for its future. "We found in Abu Dhabi a commitment to the notion that the world that is emerging is going to have eight or ten idea capitals in it, driven at their core by research universities, these places where ideas are created," said NYU's president, John E. Sexton. "The single thing to understand is that this is not a business investment for Abu Dhabi. This is a deep investment in creating an idea capital � a magnet for the whole region and the whole world, with students from India or Morocco or from Saudi Arabia."

NYU was also no doubt attracted by the emirate's offer to pay the entire cost of building and operating the new campus, following the model of Qatar's Education City (The Chronicle, October 4). Though no dollar amount has been set as part of the deal, Abu Dhabi has "committed to providing all it takes to build an A-plus university," said Mariet Westermann, whom NYU has appointed as vice chancellor for the Abu Dhabi project. The new campus is set to include extensive classroom space, library and information-technology facilities, laboratories, academic buildings, dormitories, faculty and residential housing, student services, and athletic and performing-arts facilities.

"Our mandate is to build excellence," Mr. Sexton said. "We will go through an annual budgeting process, but I think the mandate is to do what it takes to build a great university. The Crown Prince is committed to helping NYU Abu Dhabi and NYU in Washington Square to become one of the world's 10 great universities by 2020."

Abu Dhabi will also provide money to specific departments and programs on NYU's campus in Manhattan in exchange for having professors rotate to the Abu Dhabi campus. "We want our faculty to see the Abu Dhabi campus as their own," Mr. Sexton said. "The idea is to create fluidity."

The new campus, slated to open in 2010, will offer a broad range of English-language courses comparable to those of major US research universities�unlike existing American programs in the region, which tend to focus on particular subjects or disciplines. Men and women will study in the same classes. "We are very committed to training students in a truly dynamic and international environment," said Ms. Westermann.

The NYU Abu Dhabi campus will offer the same degrees that are offered in New York, with a curriculum developed by the university's New York-based faculty. The university hopes eventually to enroll more than 2,000 undergraduates and several hundred graduate students on the new campus. Its students will be chosen by NYU's Office of Admissions, relying on the same standards used for the New York campus. NYU Abu Dhabi students will be offered the opportunity to spend a semester in New York and a semester at one of the university's 12 other outposts around the world, in such places as China, Ghana, and England.

[johnslat]

Dear Sheik,

Sure it's hype, but - maybe some more JOBS.

Regards,
John

[Sheikh N Bake]

Sure--that's why I posted it. Let's hope they learn from GMU's gross mismanagement.

[johnslat]

Dear Sheik,

Is Holocaust denial really still law in Abu Dhabi today, or has that changed?

"The Zayed International Centre for Coordination and Follow-Up (ZICCF) in Abu-Dhabi has recently (27 August 2003) been closed down by its founder, the President of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Sheikh Zayed bin-Sultan al-Nahyan, for �engaging in a discourse that starkly contradicted the principles of interfaith tolerance.�


http://tinyurl.com/y992r8e

Regards,
John

[Sheikh N Bake]

That link is blocked over here, at least in Saudi.

At George Mason in RAK in 2007 the Holocaust, we were reminded, still had never happened.

[helmsman]

Let's hope they establish a Foundations program, otherwise there will be no jobs for TEFLers there. I was under the impression they were starting small with an elite cadre of local and mostly foreign students. It will be worth following closely.

[Iamherebecause]

I just started a new thread about such institutions coming under increased scrutiny. Given the GMU saga, no bad thing

[helmsman]

There's a notion going round the community that JC was a Muslim, regardless of the chronological inconsistencies that brings up. I wonder how an NYU history professor would respond if someone said that in class? A bit of a minefield, that one.

[Sheikh N Bake]

Yes. I think some NYU administrators may be living in a starry-eyed fantasyland. "Our mandate is to build excellence"? D'oh! Straight off a dog-eared undergraduate catalog from 1971...."truly dynamic and international environment..."

All the platitudes are there, the same ones pasted onto 40 US campuses in Japan, 1988-94 that have all since closed because of lack of due diligence in understanding where they were.

I don't say NYU could never establish a long-term campus in AD. But...a liberal arts college that dupicates NYU in New York City, with the academic freedoms that entails? Uh-huh. I wouldn't sent my son to college in AD there even if I lived there now.

[uaeobserver]

When dollar signs start blinking - the learning stops.....

I don't think anyone will "learn" from the GMU fiasco.

Just take a look at all the starry eyed academic executives queuing up in the various royal majlen (what's plural of majlis?).

The last Festival of thinkers had at least 50 prospective courtiers.