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In Saudi Arabia, technical education is managed by Technical and Vocational Training Corporation. However, there is no independent accrediting body to accredit the technical institutes and assure its quality, which causes the lack of unified quality assurance standards and manageable quality improvement processes. The purpose of this paper is to propose self-evaluation standards to help the technical institutes to evaluate their performance.

The author has used a brainstorming technique of local practitioners in quality assurance. Such technique was performed by adopting DACUM that stands for “Developing A CurriculUM”. The author has used a heuristic educational and training process as the foundation of the standards and processes development, namely; curriculum, environment, training managements, and instructors. A team has been established that has been trained locally and abroad on the quality assurance standards and processes. The team studied several quality frameworks of the different countries to come up with guidelines for quality self-evaluation and standards.

The author has found that such an approach is a very effective tool for improving the institutes' performance and gives them the flexibility to decide about their missions. Most of institutes' staff is reluctant to participate in the self-evaluation process because of the fear it may reveal their weaknesses, but with encouragement and motivation especially from the top management they tend to participate in such a process. Self-evaluation helps the educational institutes to be benchmarked with other international institutions, in which good practices may be adopted by the institutes' managements to achieve their vision.

The proposed approach can help the technical education institutes to manage their quality system. In addition, the implementation of such an approach might be the starting point to develop a quality system framework for the technical education in Saudi Arabia. However, further investigation is needed to measure whether applying such standards may help the technical education institutes to meet the required quality standards to attain an accreditation from the international quality agencies.

The proposed guidelines for quality standards and processes is a contribution in the accreditation and quality assurance processes for many public and private institutions in Saudi Arabia. In addition, it is an important step to standardize the quality processes.

Increasingly driven by the global education industry (GEI), a neo-liberal perspective dominates education reform agendas in transitioning economies (Ball, 2012; Steiner-Khamsi, 2016; Verger, Steiner-Khamsi, & Lubienski, 2017). The drive to equip a competitive workforce for a knowledge economy frames efforts to build stronger pathways between education and work. These efforts tend to be led by global consultancies and often overlook local challenges. Although recent literature on policy borrowing in education has highlighted the drawbacks of analyzing education out of context, countries in the Global South continue to import education models across contexts (Steiner-Khamsi, 2016). The case of Saudi Arabia, a transitioning economy with agendas heavily influenced by international management consultancies highlights the challenges faced by a profit-driven GEI. This essay argues that current approaches to education reform in the Global South fail to address existing social and cultural challenges in the local context. The standardization of education policies and provision has led to several negative consequences in education reform efforts. Through presenting the case of technical and vocational education and training (TVET) reforms in Saudi Arabia, the essay argues that engaging international education consultants in the process of education reform fails to address the local concerns of TVET and instead imports a new set of challenges to implementing a thriving further education sector in the Kingdom.

The paper explores the conditions of employment and career development in Saudi Arabia, which are found to be strongly segmented across nationalities. It discusses the main factors shaping employment and career development in Saudi Arabia, including employment policy, education and training, labour regulations, and recent Saudisation policies aimed at reducing dependence on foreign labour by replacing non‐Saudi employees with Saudi nationals. The large inflows of foreign labour, and their conditions of employment, made possible rapid economic development in Saudi Arabia, while protecting the incomes and status of the Saudi labour force. The implementation of Saudisation faces important constraints, especially in the private sector, but signals an important change in employment policy and career development.

The purpose of this paper is to explore external factors: organization technical support, organization administrative support, organization infrastructure and resources, and organization ICT policy’s effect on the commitment in use of technology among the faculty staff Hail university, Saudi Arabia.

A cross-sectional survey approach was used to collect data. A sample of 300 fulltime employees, having administrative and teaching responsibilities participated using a self-completion questionnaire. The data were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis (EFA), correlation and multiple regressions to determine the impact of external factors on the commitment in use of technology.

Overall, the results provided evidence that organization technical support, organization administrative support, and organization infrastructure and resources have a significant positive impact on the commitment in use of technology. However, organization ICT policy has an insignificant negative impact on the commitment in use of technology. The findings could be generalized on other public sector universities of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

The data were collected from one public sector university of Hail province, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Only four external factors were taken into consideration in investigating its influence on the commitment in use of technology. There could be other external/environmental factors which might be useful to underpin the theory and advance literature.

In-service and trainee faculties should take an advantage of using learning management system. Faculty should create a positive learning environment in their online classes so the learners can take a benefit out of the immense investment on ICT by ministry of higher education. Apart from giving training to teaching staff in use of technology, learners should also be given a platform to increase and improve their digital literacy. Workshops can be conducted frequently for both faculties and learners. Faculty can offer additional and out of the class support to their reluctant and weak students in order to assist them in the use of technology.

Technology integration after COVID-19 outbreak has significantly changed the education sector throughout the world. The use of technology now is unavoidable at primary, secondary and at tertiary level. This study provides an exclusive viewpoint concerning the external/environmental evidence based findings that have not been investigated empirically in the Saudi Arabian context. The current study also provides statistically a theoretical five-component model to understand the phenomena in the field of information communication technology.

The impact of education and research skills on the strategic digital transformation of education is straightforward. In this context, the Saudi National Institute of Health plays a pivotal role in the design and implementation of a resilient and robust strategy for the development of skills and competencies to young health professionals. In this chapter, the authors provide a brief overview of the Vision 2030 in Saudi Arabia and its basic priorities in the areas related to the Education and Research in the healthcare domain. The authors also elaborate on the key plans and initiatives undertaken by the education and research skills directory of the Saudi National Institute of Health (SNIH) towards transformative learning with impact on the implementation of the Vision 2030.

This chapter discusses how assistive technology (AT) has been used in Saudi inclusive schools. It also synthesises issues and challenges that play significant roles in using AT with students with disabilities in inclusive education. These topics include Kingdom of Saudi Arabia regulation and legislation for AT, teachers' attitudes and knowledge of AT, professional development, AT specialists to support AT use in inclusive education and integrating AT in students' Individual Education Plans. Moreover, the chapter explains how the education section in the Saudi Vision 2030 focusses and discusses the enhancement of AT use among students with disabilities in the inclusive education.

Education and human capital development are seen by the government of Saudi Arabia as vital to the aim of gaining knowledge economy status. Although financial investment has been evident in education and human capital development in Saudi Arabia for many years, knowledge acquisition, production, and diffusion remain problematic. The strategy that underpins the shift to a knowledge economy is based on the assumption drawn from human capital theory that education can transform individual productivity and therefore promote economic development. However, the links between education and economic growth are not as linear as this framing of education suggests, but depend on complex social processes. Within these processes, individual understandings of knowledge and knowledge creation are crucial. The implications of this for Saudi Arabia are discussed with reference to the work of Knorr Cetina (2007) on knowledge cultures and David and Foray (2002) on knowledge communities. A transition to a knowledge economy is more likely to occur when cultural and social conditions enable the development of knowledge cultures and knowledge communities.

The purpose of this study is to identify the factors that influence the willingness of Saudi Arabian students from four universities in Saudi Arabia, to adopt learning management systems (LMSs). This will be accomplished by using two popular technology acceptance models unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) and theory of planned behavior (TPB).

In total, 445 undergraduates from four Saudi educational institutions participate in filling out the study questionnaire. To investigate the correlations between the variables, the study used structural equation modeling for data analysis.

The results of the study show that effort expectancy (EE), subjective norm (SN), attitude toward behavior (ATB) and perceived behavioral control (PBC) are found to be substantially connected with their intentions to use (ITU) LMSs. The findings also show that there is a strong relationship between students’ intentions and their actual use of LMSs.

Like many studies, this research has some limitations. The primary limitation is that the findings of the study cannot be extrapolated to other settings since the report’s analysis and investigation were limited to four Saudi universities. Therefore, to generalize the study’s findings, similar research needs to be conducted in other Gulf and similar cultural universities.

The integrated model identifies key factors that influence the intent of Saudi Arabian students to use LMS, including EEs, social influence, ATB and PBC. This model can help develop solutions for the obstacles that prevent students from using LMS. The findings can be used to provide assistance to increase the likelihood of LMS acceptance as part of the educational experience. The model may also inspire further research on this topic in the Gulf nations, particularly in Saudi Arabia.

As none of the relevant studies conducted previously in Saudi Arabia has integrated the two models to study the students’ ITU LMSs, this study combines two major theories, TPB and UTAUT, in the context of Saudi Arabia, contributing to the field of technology use in education by expanding empirical research and providing a thorough understanding of the challenges associated with the use of LMS in Saudi universities. This study should be viewed as filling a crucial gap in the field. Moreover, this integrated model, using more than one theoretical perspective, brings a thorough comprehension of the barriers that hinder students’ adoption of LMSs in the academic context in Saudi Arabia and thus assists in making effective decisions and reaching viable solutions.

This study aims to explore the socio-cultural aspects of e-learning delivery in Saudi universities from the perspectives of universities’ instructors and expert designers from the Ministry of Education. More specifically, this study examined the opportunities and challenges faced in the development of online learning environments at Saudi universities from a socio-cultural perspective.

This qualitative research study addressed pervasive socio-cultural challenges connected to e-learning delivery in Saudi Arabia. Data collection methods consisted of 28 in-depth insider expert interviews as well a thematic analysis of documents related to socio-cultural aspects of e-learning delivery in Saudi Arabia.

Findings from the data analysis uncovered two main thematic areas connected to e-learning delivery in Saudi Arabia, namely, culture and female access to e-learning.

This research contributes original knowledge to international online learning research about the social and cultural complexity connected to online learning development in Saudi Arabia, as well as in other areas of the Arabic world where similar e-learning development initiatives are underway.

This research contributes original knowledge to international online learning research about the social and cultural complexity connected to online learning development in Saudi Arabia, as well as in other areas of the Arabic world where similar e-learning development initiatives are underway.

This research contributes unique knowledge about the social and cultural complexity connected to online learning development in Saudi Arabia, as well as in other areas of the Arabic world where similar e-learning development initiatives are underway.

The interaction between Saudi culture and online learning has nurtured a unique learning model that adapts to cultural values to provide a quality learning experience.

This chapter briefly explores selected English and general education policy documents, curricula, and textbooks within the context of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) from a Critical Discourse Analysis perspective and examines how they have changed pre- and post-21st century. First, a policy document related to education in KSA in general (pre-21st century) is analyzed along with an English language teaching (ELT) policy document of the same period. Next, two general policy documents post-21st century are explored, followed by one related to ELT policy. Finally, one post-21st century document related to higher education is discussed. The “network of practices” within which these documents are situated are first detailed, as well as the structural order of the discourse, and some linguistic analysis of the choice of vocabulary and grammatical structures (Meyer, 2001). Issues which might be problematic to the learning and teaching identities of the students and teachers interpreting these documents are also highlighted. Finally, we consider whether the network of practices at this institution and KSA in general “needs” the problems identified in the analysis and critically reflect on the analysis.