The paradox of higher education in Iran

TEHRAN, Iran — The Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, had a meeting with university chancellors and heads of research and educational institutions. During this meeting, Rouhani emphasized that the quality and the quantity of education should be compatible with one another in Iranian academia. He also said that although he is proud of the increasing expansion of the post-graduate programs and the number of Ph.D. students in the country, he cannot help but worry about the quality of the education that they are receiving.

Since the early years of the Islamic revolution, there has been an attempt to expand and propagate higher education in Iran. In 1982, then-speaker of the parliament Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani had unveiled plans for establishing a new university called Azad (Free) University with branches in all parts of the county, including villages.

Islamic Azad University, the third-largest university by enrollment in the world and, according to its website, with over 400 branches in Iran, was founded with this goal in mind. Azad University has a different kind of entrance exam than public universities and, unlike public universities, it does not provide free education. This may help explain why Iran’s private schools have failed to produce the same level of scholarship as public universities. For example, the public Sharif University of Technology is included in the Times Higher Education World Universities Ranking.

In 1988, Payame Noor University was founded. Payame Noor offered distant learning and half-time education. In its early years, it mostly enrolled government employees and professionals. Eventually, however, it opened its doors to other types of students and also, for the first time, enrolled undergraduate students without asking them to take the university entrance examination.