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Graduates of Lebanese Institute of Social Sciences: Which Equality in Learning, Which Equality in the Job Market?
The Lebanese Institute of Social Sciences was established in 1959. This institute teaches Social Sciences among four private universities in Lebanon. In its mandate, research and teaching are the two pillars for its work.
This Institute was working in light of this aforementioned direction till the Lebanese civil war erupted in 1975 which resulted in hindering its activities. However, during this period, while the situation of educational institutions in Lebanon remained static, higher education witnessed significant structural changes at the world level with the increasing impact of globalization,.
In 1990, with the civil war coming to an end, Lebanon entered a rehabilitation and reconstruction phase, and the institute of Social sciences like other educational institutions, was launched into many structural mutations. For instance, since 1990, the institute turned to mass education and is consequently stamped by the highest level of enrollment in comparison with other universities teaching Social Sciences in Lebanon. Moreover, it is the only institute in the Lebanese University which did not yet adopt the LMD system. However, the curricula was not substantially updated to keep pace with the evolution of the job market.
In light of this fact, one of the most important questions to raise: does the equality of chances in enrolling in higher education programmes in the Lebanese University provide the same equality in the job market?
Another pressing question to be answered is about the capacity of the local tertiary institution, which has no opportunity to coin its own conditions of graduation and its own job market, to make a fair integration in the labor division of the scientific world.
Hala Awada
Lebanese University, Institute of Social Sciences
30 September 2013