Keyword

1 Introduction

In the Information Age, the knowledge economy is at the crux of economic growth. Academic institutions, and the human expertise and research potential they possess, are important sources of knowledge that have a direct impact on every area of our lives. From ensuring a continuous and sustainable supply of safe food to the advancement of targeted therapies through precision medicine or the development of effective virtual learning environments, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) have an important role to play. In a seemingly shared effort to transition from a center of knowledge reception to a hub of knowledge production, the Arab Gulf States (particularly Qatar, UAE, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia) have garnered attention in recent years as a dominant force in higher education (HE) by attracting internationally reputed institutions and renowned faculty to the region (Madichie, 2015). In fact, the number of HEIs in the Gulf has more than doubled in the last two decades led largely by an influx of international branch campuses (IBCs) and foreign universities such as the 27 colleges and universities comprising Dubai International Academic City (DIAC) in the UAE and the eight, largely American, universities contributing to Qatar’s Education City (Wilkins, 2011). While critics like (Buckner, 2011) reduce these efforts to the mere “jazzing-up” of the region (p. 25), Coffman (2003) leans toward more genuine motivations suggesting the rapid expansion of HEIs is the result of growth in demand for the preparation of students in the Gulf for the knowledge economy. Coffman points out, for example, that the majority of the population in Gulf countries (roughly 60%) is under 18 years of age, which gives rise to the need for more HEIs in the region; furthermore, while the education of women has quickly become a hallmark of modernity in the region, conservative cultural norms typically dictate that Gulf women receive a local education unlike their male counterparts who often study abroad (Coffman, 2003, p. 17). Coffman (2003) also emphasizes the increasingly unsafe or unwelcoming living environments in the US that have encouraged many Gulf students to pursue a Western education at home since the early 2000s. Finally, the demand to provide HE for “enormous expatriate communities living long-term in the Gulf” is another factor driving the establishment of HEIs in the region (Coffman, 2003, p. 17). While there is undoubtedly a plethora of highly individualistic motivations and expectations around the development of the HE sector in the Gulf, one common aim is providing quality education that prepares students for the future. Nowhere can this be seen more than in the region’s lofty investments in graduate education. To illustrate, the newly opened and government funded Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI) in Abu Dhabi, UAE, is a graduate-level, research-based academic institution that affords all its graduate students with full scholarships inclusive of accommodations, health insurance, and a monthly stipend in exchange for full-time commitment to studying and researching in the field of AI. Similarly, Qatar’s Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU) was established in 2010 as a dedicated graduate institution committed to the discovery of innovative (and locally relevant) solutions to global challenges. Likewise, Qatar’s Emir (ruler), Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, gifted Qatar University the fully equipped research vessel, Janan, giving access to graduate researchers investigating the territorial waters of the Gulf and their natural resources. Such investments clearly signal the region’s perspective on the invaluable contribution of graduate students to the knowledge economy. Yet, despite the establishment of world-class graduate-level institutions and a wealth of research funding and facilities, graduates still face significant challenges to a successful research experience. In fact, global estimates suggest that more than half of graduate students do not complete their degree citing anxiety around the research process as a primary cause (Cho & Hayter, 2020; Litalien & Guay, 2015). Unfortunately, relatively little has been written to address this issue and even less has explored the graduate research experience within the Gulf context. This chapter aims to highlight some of the unique challenges graduate students in the Gulf face throughout the research process by discussing the graduate research experience in Qatar. This chapter is intended as a catalyst for sparking discussion in HE around innovative approaches to enhancing the graduate research experience, combating graduate attrition, and preserving a rich source of contribution to the knowledge economy.

2 Graduate Education in the GCC States

Any conversation around enhancing graduate education at a national or regional level should be informed by accurate and reliable data. However, there is a dearth of systematic information and data preservation on graduate education in the Gulf, which poses significant challenges to evidence-based decision making regarding educational policy and planning, the graduate student experience, graduate curriculum enhancement, and the monitoring and dissemination of graduate research and intellectual property. While there is a preponderance of open data on GCC schools, there is significantly less information readily available regarding higher education, and the information that is available generally combines undergraduate and graduate education, has important missing data, and/or is not updated on a consistent basis. To illustrate, the most updated higher education statistics provided on the Higher Education Council’s website in Bahrain at the time of this writing is from the academic year 2013/2014 (http://moedu.gov.bh/hec/Page.aspx?page_key=higher_education_statistics). Similarly, the Center for Higher Education Data and Statistics (CHEDS) under the United Arab Emirates’ Ministry of Education has an impressive central data collection platform utilized by the Ministry and all universities accredited in the country; however, data and reports from the platform are not openly available. Likewise, Qatar’s Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MOEHE) lists six military colleges and universities as well as nine semi-government institutions on its website but does not provide data concerning student demographics, graduate research output, or expenditure per student at these institutions.

Table 8.1 provides a snapshot of graduate education in the Gulf to date based on limited available information and highlights the need for better data and data sharing in the region. For example, Qatar has 2.8 million inhabitants and is home to 34 colleges and universities, while Bahrain has 1.6 million inhabitants and 17 HEIs. The fact that Qatar is nearly double the size of Bahrain in terms of inhabitants and number of HEIs yet reports similar university populations (33,500 and 33,000 students respectively) indicates a need for clearer and more comprehensive data. Another glaring question that arises from the Table 8.1 concerns the significantly lower percentage of university students pursuing graduate study in Saudi Arabia (only 3%) compared to other GCC countries. Similarly, data from Table 8.1 suggests there is a gender gap in graduate education in many GCC countries, namely Kuwait (76% female), UAE (66% female), and Qatar (63% female) where females represent the overwhelming majority. Al-Misnad’s (2010) extensive research exploring the gender gap in higher education in Qatar seems to have some bearing at the graduate level as well nearly a decade later. In her work, Al-Misnad reported data from the 2004 Census revealing that by the age of 25, only 46 Qatari men had university education for every 100 Qatari women with equal qualifications and that Qatar University’s student body in 2008 was 76% female (Al-Misnad, 2010). Although the gender ratio in higher education in Qatar and elsewhere in the Gulf has improved somewhat over the last ten years, intervention and understanding are still needed to secure the future development of the region. Further cooperation is needed in the collecting and sharing of data to guide both policy and practice, particularly considering that existing data poses more questions than answers.

Table 8.1 Graduate education in the Gulf
Full size table

Perhaps because graduate research does not directly factor into university rankings, the collection and maintenance of relevant data have received less attention among HEIs and governing bodies in the region. Or, in the increasingly competitive world of higher education, colleges and universities have become less transparent with institutional data in fear of losing their competitive edge. Regardless, HEIs in the region need to cooperate in a shared effort to accurately portray the landscape of graduate education including types of graduate programs, scholarships, attrition rates, cost per student, grant funds, graduate research output, completion rates, employability, industry satisfaction, etc. Such cooperation has important implications for enhancing graduate education, cultivating a positive graduate experience, and producing well-rounded competent graduates. Despite a lack of sufficient data on graduate education and research in the region, this chapter aims to shed light on the graduate experience in the Gulf by examining the case in Qatar.

3 Graduate Education in Qatar

Qatar is a small desert peninsula in the Arabian Gulf, which shares its only land border with neighboring Saudi Arabia. Despite its size (approximately 160 km), Qatar is quickly becoming an educational hub in the region boasting some of the West’s top universities including Texas A&M, Weill Cornell Medicine, University of Calgary, Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts, Northwestern University, and HEC-Paris. Beyond Qatar’s impressive suite of IBCs, its national university, Qatar University (QU), is ranked 224 globally according to the QS World University Ranking 2022 and ranks second in the MENA region, just behind King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia. Over the last decade, Qatar has witnessed tremendous growth in HE expanding from 16 institutions in 2014 to 32 institutions by 2020, with 15 universities offering graduate education to date. Despite this growth, QU is still the leading graduate institution in Qatar, which is home to nearly 80% of the country’s graduate students and more than 50 graduate degree programs. Although QU offers several humanities and social sciences programs in Arabic, most graduate programs (76%) use English as the medium of instruction. In fact, graduate education in Qatar is largely taught in English except for programs offered through the privately owned Doha Institute for Graduate Studies where Arabic is the medium of instruction. While English is essentially the language of graduate education in Qatar, most graduate students (more than 90%) are L2 students, meaning their primary or first language is not English. Understanding the unique challenges L2 graduate students in Qatar (and likely elsewhere in the Gulf) face is at the core of cultivating a positive graduate research experience.

4 Inadequate English Academic Writing Skills Among L2 Graduates

In a world where knowledge is the fuel of economic growth, graduate students, particularly doctoral students, are essential (Brinkley, 2006). The in-depth knowledge and original research of graduate students provide a rich source of discovery and innovation that drives the knowledge economy; however, all of this is largely contingent on students’ ability to effectively communicate in writing (i.e., through thesis research, scientific publications, conference papers, etc.). Unfortunately, a vast body of research suggests that L2 graduate students lack the requisite English academic writing skills (Jeyaraj, 2020; Keong & Mussa, 2015; McCarthy & Dempsey, 2017; Mehar Singh, 2019; Rigler et al., 2017; Walter & Stouck, 2020). Perhaps worse is the all-too-common assumption by HE administrators, faculty, and thesis supervisors that graduate students arrive at university as expert scholarly writers in need of little or no guidance. This mismatch between ability and expectation gives rise to a plethora of problems. For starters, poor academic writing has been documented as a primary source of conflict between graduate students and their thesis supervisors (Adrian-Taylor et al., 2007), and thesis supervisors often lack the time and know-how to develop their students’ writing skills (Whitman et al., 2014). Furthermore, when graduate students perceive they aren’t meeting the expectations of their instructors and supervisors, it can lead to feelings of shame, anxiety, procrastination, and imposter syndrome (Aldrich & Gallogly, 2020). In fact, evidence has suggested that L2 graduates are at an increased risk of developing mental health disorders including anxiety and depression largely due to the acceleration of academic life and the “publish or perish” nature of graduate study (Levecque et al., 2017). To add fuel to the fire, most graduates struggle to find the time to develop their academic writing skills when juggling work and family obligations along with the demands of a rigorous graduate program. In addition to these challenges, which are characteristic of L2 graduates in general, there are unique cultural obstacles to successful English academic writing among L2 graduates in the Gulf in particular. Good English academic writing, for example, is both direct and concise, yet Arabs generally value indirectness and lengthiness in academic writing (Al-Khatib, 2003). Likewise, good English academic writing discourages the use of elaborate language, while Arabs value such a trait in academic writing (Rass, 2011). Furthermore, good English academic writing demands proper citation of source material, while Arab students are often encouraged to memorize source material and use it verbatim posing serious threats to academic integrity when writing in English (Fawley, 2007). Because the relationship between writing and culture is so intertwined (i.e., we write to express our ideas, and our ideas are shaped by our culture), it is only logical to expect L2 graduate students’ English academic writing to reflect certain traits of the indigenous culture.

Despite this extensive evidence, graduate students, at least in Qatar, lack the infrastructure of support needed to help them develop strong English academic writing within the relatively short duration of their graduate study. In fact, of the 15 HEIs providing graduate education in Qatar, only Qatar University (QU) and Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU) have dedicated centers for supporting the development of academic writing at the graduate level. Graduate writing support at QU has been offered through the Office of Graduate Studies since 2012 and includes one-to-one consultations (in-person, online, and via telephone), synchronous and asynchronous webinars, workshops, a graduate student Blackboard community, and lecture requests where writing support staff can be invited by faculty to deliver writing lectures to classes. Similarly, HBKU established the Academic Writing and Research Excellence Center (AWARE) under the College of Humanities and Social Sciences to support academic writing in 2018 with the aim of helping students become better writers in the long term. AWARE provides support to graduate students through one-to-one appointments, workshops, and a variety of digital resources. Although both institutions are to be commended for being among the first in Qatar to acknowledge that graduate students do, in fact, need academic writing support and actually invest in the resources needed to tackle the issue, there is still much to be done. For starters, the kind of support offered through writing centers is essentially supplemental support available outside of program requirements, which means that students must find extra time to take advantage of the centers’ services. However, a more effective approach may be for centers and colleges to work together to imbed academic writing instruction into the graduate program curriculum in addition to the one-to-one writing sessions and one-off workshops offered through writing centers. Some possibilities may be to include basic academic writing instruction as part of graduate students’ orientation, require that a prescribed amount of academic writing instruction be taught in research methodology courses, imbed academic writing instruction in graduate seminars, and include one-to-one consultations with writing center staff as part of the thesis research hours. These are just a few ways writing centers and faculty/supervisors can collaborate to improve students’ writing skills and facilitate a more positive graduate research experience.

5 Beyond the Language Barriers

While inadequate English academic writing skills are a major threat to a successful graduate research experience, there are other underlying challenges as well. In Qatar, unlike in the West, students’ high school percentage at graduation largely determines their area of study at university where lower scores are associated with the humanities and social sciences and higher scores associated with sciences and medicine. A high school percentage of 70 permits a student to study business or education, for example, while an 80% opens the doors to study pharmacy, and an 85% or higher provides opportunities to study dentistry or medicine.

Although these “tracks” ensure top students enter the health and medical professions, it also has the unintended consequence of deterring them from pursuing majors in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. In such a system, there is a built-in assumption that the best students seek majors with high entry requirements, and “bad” students concede to majors with lower entry requirements. High schoolers who graduate with a 95%, for instance, may be passionate about language but instead pursue engineering because the higher entrance requirements imply a certain superiority and/or prestige. In other words, many students are concerned that choosing majors with lower entry requirements will reflect their performance rather than their preference. This has important implications for graduate study since students’ undergraduate majors determine their area of graduate study to a large extent, and to be successful in graduate study, students need to pursue an area of research from a place of passion rather than prestige. The very nature of graduate research is isolating in that one of the primary requirements is to make an original contribution to the field. In doing so, graduate students often find themselves exploring aspects of the field unfamiliar to even their supervisors. The resulting challenges require considerable discipline and perseverance; void of passion, graduate research can be a daunting, if not debilitating, experience.

Another important aspect of the graduate research experience that has largely been overlooked by universities in Qatar is the supervisor-supervisee relationship. Thesis supervisors act as mentors by broadening their students’ intellectual abilities, scaffolding the development of their technical skills, providing administrative support concerning university policy and funding, managing research project timelines, and, perhaps most importantly, providing personal and emotional support throughout the research process (Rugg & Petre, 2007). Quality thesis supervision is paramount to success in graduate study. In fact, evidence has shown that the supervisor-supervisee relationship is the most important factor contributing to the completion of doctoral research (Mainhard et al., 2009; Wellington, 2010). Nonetheless, a thorough review of university websites in Qatar reveals a glaring absence of resources and support for this all-important relationship. For example, of the 15 HEIs offering graduate programs, none provide a mentoring toolkit, mentoring handbook or guide, professional development resources, or community of practice (CoP) to share mentoring experiences, strategies, or best practices in graduate supervision. Qatar University has recently taken steps in the right direction, however, by publishing guidelines for the roles and responsibilities of faculty and students in the supervisory relationship and developing an automated system, TADESS (thesis and dissertation electronic service system) designed to support supervisors’ administrative responsibilities during thesis supervision. Still, more support is needed to ensure graduate students (and their supervisors) are thriving. Establishing opportunities for both students and faculty to voice their complaints in confidence and in a constructive manner is an excellent starting point for mapping the path to excellence in supervision. Given the ample opportunities for graduate study in Qatar, a wealth of research funding, world-class research facilities, renowned faculty, and a high value on contribution to the knowledge economy, investing in the supervisor-supervisee relationship will make an invaluable contribution to the graduate research experience.

Another barrier to cultivating a positive graduate research experience is a lack of mental health literacy (MHL) and the resulting stigma around mental health disorders in Qatar, particularly among graduate students (Bell, 2019; Elyamani et al., 2021). MHL is defined as knowledge and beliefs about mental disorders that aid in their recognition, management, and prevention (Jorm, 2015). Studies have shown that MHL in Qatar is considerably low among the public (Ghuloum & Bener, 2010) as well as among university students (Zolezzi et al., 2017). Uncoincidentally, the Arab World has been reported to have higher rates of depression, anxiety disorders, PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder), and suicide compared to any other region (Naveed, 2018; Zeinoun et al., 2020). Because graduate students are already at an increased risk of developing mental health problems (Levecque et al., 2017), HEIs in Qatar, and elsewhere in the Gulf, need to do more to promote MHL and destigmatize mental health diagnoses so students feel comfortable to seek out needed support. The demands of work, graduate study, familial obligations, and, in many cases, financial constraints can be extremely taxing for students. GCC youth, for example, have identified personal relationships and academic factors as primary sources of stress (Bell, 2019). While most universities have student counseling services with highly trained and compassionate staff, it is still considered relatively taboo for Arabs to discuss mental illness making it difficult to reach the heart of the problem. Consequently, many students internalize their struggles with mental health in fear of bringing shame to themselves and their families. Furthermore, when counseling services do attempt to raise awareness among students regarding specific mental health conditions (i.e., through workshops or trainings), they often need to package the material as to avoid cultural sensitivities. For example, a workshop on coping with addiction would likely be presented under the more generic (and palatable) topic of maintaining mental health and well-being. Likewise, a workshop on eating disorders might be presented as a workshop on maintaining a healthy and balanced diet. Such generic titles, however, fail to attract the very students they aim to help. This is particularly true at Qatar University where preserving the national identity is highly valued and associating it with any stigma should be avoided. As a result, the university faces the complex challenge of tackling an issue of great importance to the society—mental health—without offending the very community it serves. Universities under Qatar Foundation, on the other hand, have considerably more freedom as most are IBCs of Western universities where discussions of such issues are less stigmatized. Nonetheless, universities can, and should, take the lead in reshaping how mental illness and mental health disorders are viewed through advocacy and awareness. In fact, the mental health issues plaguing graduate education have been described as a mental health crisis (Charles et al., 2021); therefore, adopting a proactive attitude and normalizing discussions around mental health is fundamental to creating a great graduate research environment.

6 To Thrive or Not to Thrive

The quality of the graduate research experience is ultimately impacted by a university’s ability to cultivate a supportive and engaging environment that allows graduate students to achieve a variety of personal, professional, and academic goals. Despite the perceptions of some, the graduate research experience does not have to be a labor-intensive struggle to balance work, life, and program demands. Instead, the graduate experience should be a transformative journey fueled by many opportunities for personal and professional growth. In this view, universities have the potential to cultivate either an empowering graduate research experience or a debilitating one. If the former is desired, and we believe it is, HEIs in Qatar need to look beyond just the establishment of new institutions and fancy, well-funded research facilities. Although these things are critical to advancing the knowledge economy and reflect the country’s commitment to higher education, they neglect a key driver behind universities’ contribution to society, the graduate student. The current model of graduate education in Qatar is, to some extent and likely unintentionally, programming students to accept being overworked, overlooked, and unfulfilled. To pave the road forward, the mission of graduate education in Qatar should precisely and clearly reflect a focus on students’ thriving. Human thriving has been described quite simply as a desirable life condition (Bundick et al., 2010). Spreitzer et al. (2005) described thriving individuals as those who feel a strong sense of progress and momentum, understanding and knowledge, and aliveness. However, efforts to conceptualize the thriving graduate student and his/her environment are lacking (Coe-Nesbitt et al., 2021), but we do know that thriving students are “fully engaged intellectually, socially, and emotionally” (Schreiner, 2013). They are not bogged down and burned-out individuals whose value is calculated solely by their research profile as some graduate researchers have reported feeling (Cactus Foundation, 2020). If universities really want to invest in the graduate research experience and reap the rewards of thriving graduate students, they must adopt a holistic view to improving graduates’ overall well-being. Within the scarce literature, Coe-Nesbitt et al. (2021) point us in the right direction suggesting that interventions should focus on “enhancing the potential for students to maximize their achieving, engaging, connecting, balancing, enjoying, and being” (p. 11). This holistic approach, then, must involve both academic and non-academic experiences.

7 Conclusion

This chapter provides a brief overview of the tremendous expansion and investment in higher education that has transformed the Gulf into an educational hub with a particular focus on graduate education in Qatar and the graduate research experience. Although Qatar has made impressive strides to become a regional leader in graduate education by securing top-notch research faculty and facilities, offering unbeatable funding, importing world-class universities, and enhancing its existing ones, the graduate research experience has received far less enthusiasm. Despite graduate students’ invaluable contribution to the knowledge economy and alarming evidence concerning graduate attrition rates, remarkably little has been done to explore what graduate students need to thrive. This chapter presents some of the most pressing barriers to a successful graduate research experience in Qatar including lack of data regarding graduate education and research, inadequate English academic writing skills among graduates, lack of infrastructure to develop requisite skills, overdemanding schedules, the acceleration of academic life, ineffective supervisor-supervisee relationships, and a multitude of issues around mental health. As we barrel into the fourth industrial revolution and Education 4.0 takes shape, one must ask if the fundamental concerns highlighted here will be reconciled or exacerbated in coming years. The technological revolution of the current age is fundamentally changing how we live, work, and learn at an unprecedented pace. Will the digital tools and capabilities of this new era cultivate a thriving graduate student environment and support the overall well-being of one of our richest sources of contribution to the knowledge economy? The aim of this chapter is to spark dialogue among HE administrators, faculty, and graduate students regarding the future of the graduate research experience in Qatar and elsewhere in the Gulf.