Thabahtoona, Lay Off GJU!

Thabahtoona, The National Campaign for Defending Students' Rights has issued yet another statement criticizing GJU, the German Jordanian University, this time because of the decision to remove it from the unified admission program. This means that students have to apply to the university separately, unlike with other public universities, where the student would send a list of choices of preferred universities and majors in descending order to the coordination office, and then depending on the student's average, the number of students applying, etc, the student will be accepted in one of the choices they have listed.

Now before I delve into the reasons the university it is not listed along with other universities I'll give an overview about it. GJU, where I'm a second year student, was founded only 3 years ago. It is partly funded by the Jordanian government and partly funded by the German government. Since the official campus near Madaba is still under construction, the temporary location is at the Royal Scientific Society, in 3 buildings that are rented by the university.

The reason why it is not part of the unified admission program is very simple: the university's fees and programs are different from other universities, and when it was included, a large percentage of students who registered backed out later because they were surprised by the requirements and the fees. The higher fees, another subject of criticism, are attributed to the different educational approach used by the university. The maximum capacity of students to eventually be reached is only 5000, a maximum of only 30 students are allowed in one class, students are obliged to study German and must spend their fourth year in Germany, to name some of the features that distinguish the university.

I'm not saying this to promote the university (believe me, I'm not one to do that), nor to criticize the campaign, because they do have a good purpose. But I'm sure there are other more important things to push for. Wastas in universities, improving the quality of education itself or biased professors off the top of my head. So lay off!