The Business Year Special Report
Dr. Lilac A. E. Al-Safadi, President, Saudi Electronic University (SEU)
Already a leader in e-learning, SEU is looking at adopting further advanced technologies and innovation to support the delivery of quality education.
SEU has significant expertise in e-learning that gained new relevance when lockdowns became a way of life. How have you worked to share knowledge to benefit the nation?
We have been working with universities as well as the Minister of Education on assessing the online learning experience through providing daily reports on the performance of universities in this new digital environment. We have also worked with the technology companies and commissions on increasing the communication bandwidth and the number of servers to meet the sudden increase in usage. Our students were already familiar with a remote learning environment, so we did not face issues. One issue that yet to be resolved to date is online assessment. Assessing students electronically while maintaining a reliable proctoring system that ensures there is no cheating is a challenge. However, we are currently working on testing best practices in this area, which involves both human and AI proctoring in a hybrid model. Recently, we launched a center of innovation in e-learning to gather and package our nine-year experience in e-learning and offer services to others in the form of training, technology, and consultancy.
How has the pandemic affected demand for your courses?
SEU was always providing high quality learning. 84% of SEU graduates are employed, 85% of employers are highly satisfied with SEU graduates, more than 40% of graduates received promotion after graduation, are ranked second place in KSA standardized exams. E-learning and distance learning can be high quality, affordable, and reliable when managed with the proper quality criteria. With the pandemic, trust and acceptance have significantly changed, while the quality of our systems have persisted. The government, students, and employers are now perceiving electronic learning as the future of learning, which has created an increase in demand for SEU’s programs and services, translated in many and various strategic partnerships with government and semi-government institutes, and positioned SEU as an electronic learning house of experience and center of excellence in KSA.
How has the uptake in demand for your services and courses changed your strategy?
SEU has developed a completely new strategy to adapt to the new normal. The strategy focuses on expanding horizontally to cover new market segments and regions, and vertically to offer academic programs that meet the raft of changes in labor market driven by emerging global and local trends and the pandemic. SEU is taking a firmer stance on promoting quality e-learning, adopting advanced technologies and innovation in learning to ensure education sustainability and support the economic development of KSA various regions, and building international and local partnerships to support delivering quality education efficiently and effectively. In addition, our new business model focuses on increasing SEU revenue streams and optimizing current operations to achieve financial sustainability.
Will the future of education be more digital, and what does that mean for your business?
Prior to the pandemic, the education sector was one of least disrupted by technology. COVID-19 has accelerated the digital transformation in almost all sectors including higher education, and it will redefine the mission of the university and the philosophy of education. The world seems to have realized that quality and affordable education are not associated with buildings but with the digital infrastructure that supports scalability, efficiency and resilience and reliable, and with the global and local partnerships that supports sharing, producing, and exchanging knowledge and skills. The pandemic has created awareness and trust in electronic learning which will shape SEU’s new strategy and change its role from being only a digital consumer and service provider of education, into a digital creator and enabler to other educational institutes in their transition to online learning, and the importance of staying ahead of the curve in digital education, to fulfil its mission in providing access and guaranteeing opportunity to quality and efficient education to all market segments.