Teacher Quality Gender and Nationality I

Working Paper No.
10-06
Teacher Quality, Gender and Nationality

in the United Arab Emirates:
Dubai School of Government
A Crisis for Boys
Natasha Ridge
May 2010
Working Paper No. 10-06
Teacher Quality, Gender and Nationality

in the United Arab Emirates:
A Crisis for Boys
Author: Natasha Ridge
May 2010
The Dubai School of Government Working Paper Series is designed to disseminate
ongoing research of potential interest to individuals and institutions interested in
the development of public policy in the Arab world. Working papers are not formal
publications of the Dubai School of Government. Circulation is designed to stimulate
discussion and comment, often leading to further revision prior to formal publication.
Findings and conclusions are solely those of the authors, and should not be attributed to
the Dubai School of Government.
Natasha Ridge is a Research Fellow at the Dubai School of Government.
Correspondence:
Natasha Ridge, Dubai School of Government, World Trade Centre, Convention Tower,
Level 7, P.O. Box 72229, Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Tel.: 971 04 329-3290,
Fax: 972 04 329-3291, e-mail: natasha.ridge@dsg.ac.ae.
4 May 2010
Contents
Abstract ..... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6. .
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
..
The UAE Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9

..
Teacher Gender and Student Achievement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11

....
Teacher Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12

....
a) Background characteristics . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 ....
b) School characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14 ....
c) Institutional characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15 ....
Examining Teacher Quality in the UAE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

....
1. Background characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16 ....
a) Nationality and gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16 ....
b) Years of experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17 ....
c) Teacher education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18 ....
d) Family demands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21....
2. School characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21

....
a) Leadership quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 ....
b) Access to resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 ....
3. Institutional characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 ....
a) Salary scales and terms of employment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24 ....
b) Professional development policies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24 ....
c) Promotion opportunities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25 ....
4. Cumulative impact of background, school and institutional

characteristics on teacher quality and student achievement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26
....
Intersections of Gender, Nationality and Teacher Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

....
a) Conditions of contract teachers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

....
b) The quality of contract teachers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

....
Conclusions and Implications for Policy Makers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

....
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31
....
Teacher Quality, Gender and Nationality in the United Arab Emirates: A Crisis for Boys 5
Abstract
While much attention within the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has been paid to the poor
quality of school education, the discussion has yet to move beyond Western conceptions
of issues related to teacher quality and student achievement. School inspections
conducted in Dubai (KHDA 2009) found that government schools, and boys’ schools in
particular, were the worst performing schools in the Emirate, a finding supported by the
2007 TIMSS results and by Ministry of Education (MOE) examination results for the UAE
as a whole. However, despite rising concerns about the poor performance of boys, policy
makers to date have failed to examine the quality of the expatriate, male teachers who
are largely responsible for teaching them.
This paper looks at teacher quality within the UAE, casting it as a function of teacher
background characteristics, school characteristics and institutional characteristics.
The data used was gathered from teacher observations, student surveys and teacher
questionnaires conducted in eight MOE secondary schools. The paper finds that there are
deficiencies in the recruitment, training and ongoing management of male, expatriate
teachers which may explain, at least in part, the poor performance and retention of boys.
6 May 2010
Introduction
To date, there has been little to no research that has comprehensively examined the
quality of schooling in the Middle East. Research on school quality in the region has
tended to focus on test scores (Al Khateeb 2001, Mittelberg and Lev Ari 1999) and to
a lesser degree on the use of technology in the classroom (Cloke and Al-Ameri 2000),
Islam in education (Sonbol 2006, Zia 2006), or the experience of girls (Ayalon 2002,
Doumato and Posusney 2003, Moghadam 2003). Teacher quality has largely been
examined in largely qualitative terms, looking at teachers as agents of change (Clarke
2006) teacher perceptions (McNally et al. 2003), or through descriptive overviews
such as Gardner (1995). Policy makers in the region therefore have typically looked
to literature and consultants from outside when trying to conceptualize solutions for
improving teacher quality. However, this is a dangerous game.
The literature on teacher quality from OECD countries is based on a very particular set
of assumptions. It assumes that there are uniform salary scales, uniform labor laws
and, most importantly, that these nations use teachers who are typically trained in
the country in which they are working or are, at the very least, citizens of it. Likewise,
in discussions on teacher quality from the developing world, the assumption is again
that the teachers are from the country in which they work, despite the use of differing
pay scales or working conditions. The assumption that teachers in a particular country
are citizens of that country leads to certain other assumptions as well. For instance, it
is assumed that they all have the same rights, the same legal recourse and the same
access to healthcare, pensions and other forms of social security. While the assumption
of uniform citizenship may be true in the majority of countries in the world, in the
Arabian Gulf it is not the case.
In the United Arab Emirates, the rapid expansion of public education has led to a situation
where over 80% of the male teachers working in the public sector are expatriate Arabs
from neighboring countries (MOE 2008). Due to the absence of an immigration policy,
these teachers are, in essence, contract teachers who will leave the country when their
employment finishes. The situation is anecdotally reported to be similar in Bahrain and
Qatar, where the figures are estimated to be even higher. This dependence on a foreign
workforce in the public education sector complicates the way in which teacher quality
in the Emirates needs to be assessed; it means that studies from the West become
increasingly irrelevant, and studies from the region are currently nonexistent.
This paper therefore makes a unique contribution to the study of teacher quality in the
region. For the first time, it examines the case of expatriate teachers working in the
United Arab Emirates’ public education system and demonstrates how current policies
relating to the selection and employment of these teachers are having a cumulatively
negative impact on the education of boys, and thus on future national development
aspirations. The paper draws on data from a study by Ridge (2008) in the Emirate of Ras
Al Khaimah, as well as on data from the Ministry of Education and the 2007 Trends in
Mathematics and Science Study (TIMMS).
The paper begins with a discussion of the literature on teacher quality, and identifies
three key areas that need to be considered — background characteristics, school
characteristics and institutional characteristics. Each of these is then discussed in turn for
the case of the UAE; it can be seen that at each level there are vast differences between
the expatriate, contract teachers and the Emirati teachers. The paper examines the
cumulative effect of both sets of teachers on students in government schools and finds
that boys, perhaps as a result of being taught mostly by expatriate, contract teachers, are
less likely to remain in school and more likely to do poorly. The paper concludes with a
discussion of why this has happened, and recommendations for policy makers on how
to address the situation to ensure that both Emirati boys and girls are taught by the best
teachers possible.
8 May 2010
The UAE Context
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has a per capita income of around US$40,000 (IMF
2009), the eighteenth highest in the world. Despite this great wealth, it also has a
public education system that is increasingly seen as failing to meet the most basic
needs of its students (Ridge 2008, Lewis 2010). In particular, there are grave concerns
about the education of boys. In comparison to their female counterparts, boys are
achieving less and are more likely to drop out of school early. Boys in Grade 10 are
dropping out at rates of up to 11% in a single year in some emirates, and as high as
30% for a cohort (MOE 2007). Girls are more likely to graduate from high school,
achieve higher grades, and continue on to higher education than boys. They currently
comprise roughly 70% of the higher education student population and 100% of
the undergraduate teacher education program at the UAE University1, the largest
government teacher education institution.
While there have been a number of anecdotal explanations put forward to explain
the low participation and high dropout rates of boys in the UAE, there has been
little systematic study of the schooling experiences of boys or girls which may help to
explain why boys are so disengaged from their education and why so many boys are
leaving school before they complete their education. Conditions in government boys’
secondary schools differ markedly from those of girls’ secondary schools. Ridge (2008)
found that boys were more likely to be hit by their teachers than girls, they liked school
less, and were reported to have more discipline problems. The same study also found
that there were vast differences in school quality between boys and girls secondary
schools, in particular with regard to teaching and teachers.
It is important to note at this point that all public schooling in the United Arab Emirates
is segregated by gender; however, women teach in both boys’ and girls’ schools at the
primary level, while at the preparatory and secondary levels, boys are taught by men
and girls are taught by women. Recently, some women have begun teaching boys in
the preparatory level but they are still very few in number.
In terms of teachers, in the early stages of the UAE there were very few Emirati teachers
and no local teacher training institutes (Gardner 1995). The majority of teachers were
largely drawn from neighboring Arab countries, in particular from Egypt (Findlow,
2001). In fact, the Egyptian curriculum was also widely used in many schools until the
development of a national curriculum in 1985 (Suliman 1990). In 1994, just 26% of
teachers in the UAE were Emiratis, a 500% jump from the numbers in 1984-85 (State
University 2010). In 2009, the Ministry of Education strategy stated that Emiratis made
up only 11% of the male teachers in government schools, while Emirati females made
up 71% of the female teacher population. However, in some emirates, such as Ras
Al Khaimah, over 80% of female teachers were Emirati. Thus, there has been rapid
1
Conversation with Dr Gary Ingersoll, Dean of the College of Education, United Arab Emirates University, 2009.
growth in the overall number of Emirati teachers from the country’s federation in 1971
until 2010, but this has largely been the result of a large number of female entrants.
Teacher education programs can be found at all three of the public higher education
institutions—the United Arab Emirates University (UAEU), Zayed University (ZU) and
the Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT)—and more recently at the newly established
Emirates College of Advanced Education in Abu Dhabi. While these programs have
attracted large numbers of female, Emirati students, they have not had the same success
with male Emirati students, and at UAEU there are no males in the undergraduate
education programs. At the recently established Emirates College of Advanced Education,
there were only six male students in the 2009-10 cohort.
Part of the incentives for Emirati females to become teachers have included the
gender-segregated, and therefore culturally acceptable, working environment, the
ease of obtaining employment and good job security (Abdulla 2007). However, there is
speculation that the abundance of other forms of employment for males, coupled with
relatively lower salaries, has led to fewer and fewer Emirati males entering the profession.
As a result of this and the requirement that only men can teach boys at the secondary
level, the Ministry of Education has had to continue to hire male teachers from the
greater Arab world. It is in this context that this paper is set.
10 May 2010
Teacher Gender and Student Achievement
In order to investigate the issue of teacher quality in a gender-segregated school
system such as the UAE, it is important to begin with a consideration of the role and/or
impact of the gender of the teacher. Some might argue that males are inferior teachers
simply by virtue of being male. Fortunately, teacher gender has been studied in relation
to both its impact on student achievement and its impact on student attitudes and
perceptions. With regard to its impact on student achievement, the results are far
from conclusive. Dee (2006), in his analysis of the National Educational Longitudinal
Study (NELS) data, found that in terms of test score data boys performed better when
taught by men and girls when taught by women. However, a study by Krieg (2005),
based on data from the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WALS), found
that students of male teachers perform worse than students of female teachers. In a
study of teaching quality and student achievement in rural China, Xuehui et al. (2008)
also found that gender of the teacher was not related to students’ academic success or
engagement.
In terms of student attitudes, the evidence is also inconclusive. A study of seven- to

eight-year-olds’ interactions with their teachers by Carrington et al. (2007) found that
for students, teacher gender was of much less concern than the type of teacher they
were; for example, if they were kind or treated the children fairly. They found that
matching teachers and pupils by gender had no discernible impact on either boys or
girls, or on their respective attitudes toward school. This supports Lahelma’s (2000)
study on Finnish youth, which revealed that teacher gender had little or no bearing on
the student’s evaluation of individual members of staff. Likewise in Australia, studies on
the educational needs of boys by Linguard et al. (2002) and Martin and Marsh (2005)
also indicated that the gender of teachers does not have a noticeable impact on either
the achievement or attitudes of students.
Other studies have found that boys and girls are no less motivated or engaged in
classes taught by females than those taught by males (Martin and Marsh 2005).
Some studies, however, have suggested that male teachers are likely to select a more
aggressive disciplinary approach towards boys (Rodriguez 2002) and that female
teachers tend to provide a more positive overall classroom environment than male
teachers do (Stake and Katz 1982). Carrington et al. (2007) found that boys and girls
taught by women “were more inclined to show positive attitudes towards school
than their peers taught by men.” Overall, therefore, the gender of the teachers is not
conclusively linked to either student performance or attitudes.
Teacher Quality
Teacher quality is perhaps one of the most widely studied topics in education, and for
good reason. Ingvarson and Rowe (2007) find that studies consistently indicate that in
excess of 40% of the residual variance in measures of student performance (adjusted
for students’ background and intake characteristics) is at the class or teacher level. Eric
Hanushek, in his studies on teachers and student achievement in the USA, has also
found that “a good teacher will get a gain of one and a half grade level equivalents,
whereas a bad teacher will get a gain of only half a year for a single academic year.” He
adds that “high quality teachers can make up for the typical deficits that we see in the
preparation of kids from disadvantaged backgrounds” (Hanushek 2002: 3). A report
published in 2010 from the Grattan Institute in Australia cites a study by Leigh that finds
that “a student with a high quality teacher could achieve in three quarters of a year what
a student with a less effective teacher could do in a full year (Grattan Institute 2010: 8).
However, the problem that these studies and others (Carnoy 2007, Hanushek et al. 2004)
face is not a matter of finding whether or not teachers make a difference, but, rather,
identifying what it is exactly that teachers do or do not do that makes them better or
worse. Thus, definitions of a “high quality” teacher have either been very broad, focusing
on every aspect that may be a variable, or very narrow, focusing only on measurable
characteristics such as years of experience or amount of teacher training.
Studies on factors affecting teacher quality can be grouped into roughly three categories.
First, there are studies that examine teacher quality as a function of what the teacher
brings with them to the classroom; that is, their background characteristics. These include
the education they have received, the type of teacher training programs they have passed
through, and the years of experience they have. It also includes the teacher’s personal
attributes, including family and cultural factors. The second category of studies examines
how the school impacts teacher quality. These studies look at the impact of leadership
on teacher quality, accessibility of resources for teachers, and the role of overall working
conditions. Finally, there are studies which examine the role of broader institutional
factors in helping or hindering teachers to be effective. Studies in this category examine
the role of the state in its capacity to set salaries, pensions and overarching employment
guidelines for teachers. Each of these will be examined in turn.
a) Background characteristics
Studies on teacher quality in relation to teacher education (Hanushek 1996, 1989,
1986; Darling-Hammond 2000; Chapman and Adams 2002; Heyneman and Loxley
1983; Fuller and Clarke 1994; Kremer 1995) have mixed results. Hanushek (1996, 1986,
1989) and Chapman and Adams (2002) found that teacher education, experience and
salaries have no effect on student performance. In contrast, a number of other studies
from developing countries have found that teacher education and experience do affect
achievement (Heyneman and Loxley 1983, Fuller and Clarke 1994, Kremer 1995). Using
12 May 2010
data from across the US, Linda Darling-Hammond (2000, p.1) also finds that measures
of teacher preparation and certification are “by far the strongest correlates of student
achievement in reading and mathematics, both before and after controlling for student
poverty and language status.” Looking at teacher preparation programs that produce
quality teachers, Darling-Hammond (2006) and Levine (2006) find that components
such as coherent and aligned coursework and consistent connections between theory
and practice characterize the most effective programs. The importance of teacher
training which builds practical skills for the classroom is also highlighted in a 2007
McKinsey report on the top-performing nations on the Program for International
Student Assessment (PISA).
The verbal or intellectual aptitude of teachers has also been found to correlate with
better student achievement; thus, quality teachers tend to have higher scores on
licensure and aptitude examinations (Ferguson and Ladd 1996). In Finland, the top
scoring country on the PISA study, teaching is one of the top two desirable professions
and teachers are recruited from the top 10% of graduates. Likewise, South Korea
recruits its teachers from the top 5% of graduates and Singapore and Hong Kong
recruit from the top 30% of graduates; each of these countries is consistently in the
top five countries for the PISA and TIMSS (McKinsey 2007).
Teachers in lower performing countries, however, are more likely to be drawn from
the bottom end of the pool. This is particularly the case in the developing world,
where salaries for teachers are often below subsistence levels and teaching is often
a profession of the last resort. In the Middle East this is particularly true, as the most
sought after fields for university are medicine, dentistry, engineering and related fields.
Teachers have often only selected the profession because that was the only course of
study they could get accepted into at a public university (Hartmann 2008).
Another background factor which may be of particular significance in the case of the
UAE is the teacher’s place of birth relative to that of the student. In Xuehui et al.’s
2008 study on teacher quality in rural China, they found a positive and significant
relationship between a teacher’s place of birth and the level of student engagement.
Typically, students who came from the same village as their teachers were less absent
and more engaged than those whose teachers were from other villages. While studies
on the effect of having teachers from the same geographical location as their students
are relatively rare, it may be that in tightly knit communities such as the UAE, this may
be of particular relevance. Male teachers tend to come from countries outside of the
UAE while female teachers are almost entirely from the UAE (MOE 2007).
Family demands also affect teachers (Cooper and Alvarado 2006; Scafidi, Sjoquist,
and Stinebrickner 2002), and have been found to be one of the main reasons why
teachers exit the profession in the USA. In the developing world, studies have
tended to focus more on the families of students, and there has been little study
on the role that a teacher’s family plays in terms of affecting quality. However,
studies have found that low salaries paid to teachers in developing countries can
force teachers to take second jobs (Ayyash-Abdo 2000). In terms of gender issues,
male teachers in patriarchal societies such as those found in the Arab world are
saddled with the expectation that they will provide for the family (Kandiyoti 1988).
The larger the family, therefore, the more the man will have to work to provide for
them. In addition, female teachers are more likely to be married and thus will not
typically be the sole wage earner in the family (Ayyash-Abdo 2000).
b) School characteristics
School characteristics are often referred to in terms of working conditions which
impact teacher quality through retention of teachers (Center for Teaching Quality
2007, Lankford et al. 2002), job satisfaction and motivation. Probably the most
important factors at the school level are leadership (Hirsch and Church 2009,
Johnson 2006, Meng-Chun Chin 2007) and the presence of adequate resources
(Hirsch and Church 2009, Johnson 2006), both of which impact the type of working
conditions that teachers face on a daily basis. Leadership in a school determines
the amount of autonomy teachers have and whether or not they have a role in the
decision making process in their school (Johnson 2006). Leadership also determines
the organizational structure in the school that defines teachers’ positions, their
relationships with other teachers and students in terms of authority, as well as
workload and supervisory arrangements (Johnson 2006). A good leader will set
a tone for school that makes working in it a pleasure for teachers, while a poor
leader will do the reverse (Marzano 2003). Transformational leadership, which is
characterized by leaders who develop a shared vision of the school, build school
culture and distribute leadership (Meng Chun-Chin 2007), has been found to have
positive and significant effects on student achievement and teacher job satisfaction
(Meng Chun-Chin 2007, Hirsch et al. 2006).
The availability of resources for teachers includes everything from the buildings and
facilities in which they work, to whether or not they have to pay for photocopying, or
have enough gym equipment, art supplies or laboratory materials. Teachers who do not
have access to the resources they need report higher levels of dissatisfaction (Johnson
2006) and may not be able to help their students achieve to the best of their abilities.
In extreme cases in the developing world, a lack of textbooks means that students are
forced to spend their time copying down the textbook rather than learning the material
within it (Michaelowa 2002). In addition, teachers may also look to students and their
families to provide additional resources, through cash payments or in kind, such as pens,
worksheets or even classroom furniture (Glewwe and Kremer 2005). The availability
of resources is determined in part by the school leader, and in part by the broader
institutional framework in which the school is situated which determines the amount of
funding a school receives.
14 May 2010
c) Institutional characteristics
Institutional characteristics are therefore also of vital importance to ensuring teacher
quality. These include the selection of teachers, pay scales and contractual conditions
under which teachers work in a public setting.
Teacher quality is determined in the beginning by how teachers are selected. At the risk
of using a very overused case, in Finland, the top performing PISA country, teachers are
selected from the top 10% of graduates (McKinsey 2007). Getting a teaching job in
Finland is also fiercely competitive, with ten applicants for every one job (Crace 2003).
In order to attract top graduates, high performing countries pursue a deliberate policy
of lifting the status of teaching through a combination of marketing and recruitment
techniques, removing obstacles for people to become teachers, and by developing
ways to remove low-performing teachers from the classroom (McKinsey 2007).
Once teachers are accepted into the profession, the question of pay and contractual
conditions becomes more important. In situations where there are not uniform pay
scales, such as in the United Arab Emirates, studies have shown that teachers who
are paid less than others with the same skills and qualifications may suffer from
a “disgruntled worker” effect (De Laat and Vegas 2005), which can lead them to
“withdraw effort.” Studies on the use of contract teachers in Africa have found that
the longer contract teachers work, the more dissatisfied they become with their pay
(De Laat and Vegas 2005), as pay rates are less than those of regular teachers. De Laat
and Vegas (2005) also found that that student achievement was less for students of
contract teachers than for students of regular teachers, holding student background
and other factors constant. Overall, they found that student achievement was higher in
schools where the share of contract teachers was lower. A study of teacher incentives
and contract teachers in India found that teacher performance pay was highly
effective in improving student learning (Muralidharan and Sundararaman 2009); this is
something that also may be applicable in the UAE.
Examining Teacher Quality in the UAE
For the case of the UAE, I will be examining teacher quality in the three categories
described earlier and summarized below:
1. Background characteristics
Background characteristics consist of what a teacher brings to the school and
classroom, and to the education system as a whole. For this paper, teacher
education, gender, nationality, years of experience, places of experience, marital
status and demands from family will be considered.
2. School characteristics
School characteristics comprise those factors which the teacher cannot control,
but are present in the school in which he or she works. In this paper, this includes
student background, leadership quality and access to resources.
3. Institutional characteristics
These are factors defined in the UAE by the Ministry of Education or the Ministry
of Labor that affect a teacher. This paper will focus on recruitment of teachers,
salary scales, contract terms and conditions, training policies and promotion
opportunities.
This paper will compare male and female, expatriate and national teachers in the UAE
for each of these categories using data from the Ministry of Education, the author’s own
study of schools in Ras Al Khaimah (Ridge 2008), and the 2007 TIMSS Encyclopedia.
1. Background characteristics
a) Nationality and gender
The UAE public sector teacher workforce as a whole is comprised of two groups of
teachers: expatriate teachers from Arab states, and Emiratis. Restrictions, which forbid
women from teaching boys upwards from Grade 10, combined with a shortage of male
Emirati teachers,2 have meant that there is a continuing need to bring in male teachers
from nearby Arab states. This has resulted in the majority of boys in public secondary
schools being taught by expatriate Arab teachers.3 The reverse, however, is true in
girls’ secondary schools, as there is now a surplus of Emirati female teachers in the
marketplace. Studies show that in girls’ schools, there can be anywhere from 70% to
100% Emirati female teachers (MOE 2007).
2
Rania Moussly, “No one wants to teach,” Gulf News, November 22, 2009, accessed at
http://gulfnews.com/news/gulf/uae/education/no-one-wants-to-teach-1.530676?localLinksEnabled=false.
3
MOE figures for 2007 put the number at around 80%.
16 May 2010
Figure 1: Ras Al Khaimah male education employees by nationality
8%
Emiratis
26%
Egyptians
21% Syrians
Jordanians
Others
31%
14%
Source: Ridge 2008
In the Emirate of Ras Al Khaimah, only 26% of all males working in education,
including administration, are Emiratis. The remaining 74% are from other Arab
countries (as the language of instruction is Arabic, teachers need to be Arabic speakers
in order to qualify for a position). The majority of non-Emirati teachers are Egyptian
(31%). The next largest group is the Jordanians, who comprise 21% of education
employees, followed by Syrians at 14%. The remaining 8% consists of Palestinians,
Sudanese and nationals from other Arab countries. By far, then, the largest three
groups are the Egyptians, Jordanians and Syrians. These three groups are responsible
for teaching the majority of male secondary students in Ras Al Khaimah, and most
probably in the UAE as a whole, where similar percentages of male teachers are also
found.4
In the study in Ras Al Khaimah (Ridge 2008), which surveyed 32 teachers in 8

government secondary schools 100% of the male teachers were expatriate Arabs
from Sudan, Jordan, Palestine, Egypt and Syria with the majority of these (25%) being
from Egypt. However, in terms of the female teachers in the study sample, 80% were
Emiratis from Ras Al Khaimah, while 20% were expatriates from Syria and Egypt. Out
of the 18 expatriate teachers in the study, only two were female while the remaining
16 were male. Of the Emirati teachers in the sample, 100% were female.
b) Years of experience
On average, expatriate teachers from the study sample had 20 years of experience,
while the Emirati teachers had around nine years of experience. This reflects the
fact that, first, the UAE is a very new country and, second, that teacher education
programs within the UAE have only recently been established. In contrast, the rest of
the Arab world has been producing and training teachers for a substantially longer
period of time.
4
Interviews with MOE and KHDA officials, 2008
c) Teacher education
Teacher education in the UAE
In the United Arab Emirates, teacher education programs are offered for nationals
at all three public higher education institutions: UAE University, The Higher Colleges
of Technology and Zayed University. At Zayed University and the Higher Colleges of
Technology, the faculty are predominantly from English-speaking countries such as the
USA, Canada, Australia and the UK, and they are predominantly female. At UAEU, the
majority of faculty are expatriate Arab males (Findlow 2001).
In terms of the program requirements at UAEU, students have to complete a required

number of pedagogical classes in addition to their specialization. Students undergo a
semester of in-school practicum supervised by their professors in their final semester
of study. Prior to this, they spend some days in school to observe teachers and get the
feel for the school environment. Students can study for a bachelor’s degree in Early
Childhood, Elementary, Secondary or Special Education. UAEU has also recently launched
a master’s program in Education.
The Higher Colleges of Technology offer four bachelor-level degrees: a Bachelor

of Education in English Language Teaching in Schools, a Bachelor of Education in
Educational Technology, a Bachelor of Education in Early Childhood Education and a
Bachelor of Education in Career Advising and Career Counseling. The HCT stress the
importance of teaching practice; therefore, in the B.Ed. in English Language Teaching,
students spend 155 days on school placements (Kamali 2009).
Finally, Zayed University offers two undergraduate degree programs: a Bachelor of

Science in Technology and Education, and a Bachelor of Science in Education. Under the
Bachelor of Science in Education students can specialize in early childhood education;
upper primary and preparatory education; children, youth and family services; or, school
social work. At the postgraduate level, the university offers a Master of Education
specializing in Educational Leadership, and a Master of Education in Special Education.
These programs emphasize pedagogy, and include three practicum blocks, over the
course of each program, which focus on developing skills in the classroom.
In the Ras Al Khaimah study (Ridge 2008), the majority of Emirati teachers attended UAEU,
but some of the English language teachers went to either Zayed University or to the HCT.
This is largely because the study only examined secondary schools, and neither Zayed
University nor the Higher Colleges of Technology offers courses to train secondary school
teachers in other subjects.
Teacher education and certification in Egypt, Syria and Jordan
Teacher certification requirements vary widely between Egypt, Syria, Jordan, those of the
top performing TIMSS countries, and the UAE. Tables 1 and 2 show data taken from the
2007 TIMSS Encyclopedia regarding teacher education for math and science teachers in
Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Dubai, Chinese Taipei, Singapore, Australia and England. It can be
18 May 2010
Table 1: Requirements for becoming a middle/lower secondary grade math teacher
DEGREE PRE-PRACTICUM SUPERVISED PASSING A COMPLETION OF COMPLETION OF

RANK IN
COUNTRY FROM TEACHER DURING TEACHER PRACTICUM CERTIFICATION A PROBATIONARY MENTORING OR
TIMSS
ED PROGRA M EDUCATION IN THE FIELD EXA M TEACHING PERIOD INDUCTION PROGRA M
Egypt 38 Yes No Yes No No No

Syria 37 Yes Yes Yes No No Yes
Jordan 31 Yes No No No No No
Dubai 28 (est.) Yes Yes Yes Yes No Yes
Chinese Taipei 1 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No
Singapore 3 No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
England 6 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No
Australia 14 Yes Yes Yes No Yes No
Source: TIMSS Encyclopedia, 2007
Table 2: Requirements for becoming a middle/lower secondary grade science teacher
DEGREE PRE-PRACTICUM SUPERVISED PASSING A COMPLETION OF COMPLETION OF

RANK IN
COUNTRY FROM TEACHER DURING TEACHER PRACTICUM CERTIFICATION A PROBATIONARY MENTORING OR
TIMSS
ED PROGRA M EDUCATION IN THE FIELD EXA M TEACHING PERIOD INDUCTION PROGRA M
Egypt 41 Yes No No Yes No No

Syria 32 No No No Yes No No
Jordan 20 Yes No No No No No
Dubai 18 (est.) No Yes Yes Yes No Yes
Chinese Taipei 2 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No
Singapore 1 No Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
England 5 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No
Teacher Quality, Gender and Nationality in the United Arab Emirates: A Crisis for Boys
Australia 13 Yes Yes Yes No Yes No
Source: TIMSS Encyclopedia, 2007
19
seen that the first area of difference is with regard to the requirement for teachers to
complete a probationary teaching period. None of the Arab countries (including the
UAE) require this, while Singapore and Chinese Taipei—two of the top three performing
countries—as well as England and Australia, all require a probationary period. This period
provides a time during which teachers are assessed by peers as to how well they are
able to teach, and to determine if they are suited to the teaching profession. It signals
that entry to the profession is not automatic, and is contingent upon meeting certain
professional benchmarks. In the three counties in question (Syria, Egypt and Jordan),
it appears that once someone has a teaching job, there is no question of his or her
suitability to the job.
The second major teacher certification difference between expatriate Arab teachers and
others lies in the requirement of a pre-practicum during the teacher education process.
In the case of science teachers in Syria, Egypt and Jordan, they do not undergo a pre-
practicum during their teacher education. There is also no pre-practicum for Egyptian
and Jordanian math teachers. This is in contrast to the top performing countries and the
UAE, which require that all teachers undergo a pre-practicum session during their teacher
education program. The pre-practicum provides teacher education students the opportunity
to go into classrooms and practice teaching while being supervised by their professors. They
are then able to reflect on their experiences and learn how to improve their teaching skills.
As this practice does not exist in the three countries from which the UAE draws the majority
of its expatriate teachers, it should give pause to the quality of pedagogical skills that
teachers from these countries are equipped with when they arrive in the UAE.
In addition to not mandating a pre-practicum session for either math or science teachers
who are about to enter the classroom, there is typically no supervised practicum at any
earlier stage of the teacher education process in any of the three countries. Of the three
countries only Jordan offers some type of practicum experience but only for math not
science teachers. The absence of practicum sessions for science teachers, however, raises
questions about what type of supervised practicum math teachers are actually receiving,
as typically practicums are required either across the board or not at all. This leads to a
third major difference—consistency in teacher training requirements. In all of the top
performing countries, the requirements for math and science teachers are exactly the
same. However, in the three countries from which the UAE draws the majority of its
expatriate teacher workforce, there are differences between how science teachers and
math teachers are trained, and there do not appear to be national standards for teacher
training in any of the three countries. This lack of coherence and consistency in teacher
training in Egypt, Syria and Jordan gives further cause for concern, and even more so
given the poor performance of their students, both within the countries themselves and
in the UAE.
In summary, according to the 2007 TIMSS Encyclopedia, the requirements to be a

teacher in Egypt, Syria and Jordan are not the same as for the top performing countries
in the world, or as for the UAE. They do not emphasize pedagogy and rarely require a
20 May 2010
practicum experience, either during their teacher training or afterwards. This, coupled
with the lack of a probationary period for teachers in these countries, means that they
are also subject to less scrutiny and are certified immediately upon leaving teacher
training. It appears that there is much more emphasis placed on teachers’ learning
subject content, rather than on how to teach it. This approach is clearly not successful,
as evidenced by the poor performance of Egyptian, Syrian and Jordanian students in
the TIMSS (2007). This is important to consider in the UAE, as these are the teachers
being imported to teach the majority of national boys, whose failure and dropout rates
are on the increase.
d) Family demands
Finally, an important but somewhat overlooked characteristic of expatriate teachers

in the UAE is that they are usually the sole wage earners for their families. In the
study conducted in Ras Al Khaimah by Ridge (2008), all the male teachers in the
sample were found to be sole wage earners, in comparison with only one female
teacher. The remaining 15 female teachers, of which 13 were UAE nationals, were
secondary wage earners. Male teachers, therefore, are more likely to have the full
financial burden upon them to provide for their immediate family, and usually for
the extended family back in their home countries as well. There are two possible
consequences of this. First, there is an impact on how much teachers spend out
of their own pockets to provide extra learning materials for their lessons. All the
female teachers reported spending their own money on photocopying and lesson
materials, while none of the male teachers reported spending their own money.
Second, the significant economic burden placed upon the sole wage earning males
may incentivize them to try and make as much money as they can during their stay
in the UAE. Therefore, the incentive for male expatriate teachers to engage in private
tuition to supplement their incomes is very high. This poses additional, and hitherto
unexplored, challenges for the UAE education system, which are examined later in
this paper. Family demands thus play an important role in determining how much
is available to be spent on providing students with additional classroom materials
other than the textbook (if the school is not providing adequate resources), and also
contribute to the incentive to give private tuition.
2. School characteristics
For the purposes of this paper, school characteristics refer to the quality of leadership,
as well as access to and quality of resources, in terms of how these both affect teacher
quality. Transformational leadership, as described by Meng Chun-Chin (2007), refers
to leadership that takes an active role in the school, distributes leadership and creates a
positive and shared school culture. This type of leadership has been shown to improve
both quality of teaching and quality of learning. Adequate resources are needed by
teachers in order to help them do their job to the best of their ability, and are linked
more specifically to teacher motivation which, in turn, is linked to quality as measured
by student achievement (Johnson 2006).
a) Leadership quality
Overall the study in Ras Al Khaimah (Ridge 2008) found that leadership quality did not vary
significantly between male and female principals in terms of their education and experience.
However, the study found that 68.8% of male teachers rated their school leadership as very
supportive or extremely supportive, while only 50.1% of female rated their management in
the same way (Ridge 2008). While this finding was not statistically significant, it is interesting
given that during the observations most male principals were observed to spend most
of their time in their offices and rarely moved around the school or entered classrooms
(Ridge 2008). They also typically depended upon one or two of the expatriate teachers
or their deputy to manage the school. It seems that the incentives for the expatriate male
teachers not to give a bad review of their Emirati principal were much higher than those for
female teachers, who were predominantly Emirati. Certainly, there was more risk to their
employment for male teachers who gave a negative report of their (Emirati) principals.
While 12.4% of female teachers said that the management was “not supportive” or only
“a little supportive,” no male teachers described their management in the same way (Ridge
2008). This was also difficult to believe given the author’s observations; again, it is likely this
can be attributed more to power differentials in the schools then to the reality of leadership.
As female teachers were largely Emiratis reporting about their Emirati principals, they had
little to fear with regard to job security.
Student opinions on leadership in their schools in the Ras Al Khaimah study were more
revealing and supported the author’s observations of principals; only 22% of female
students reported that they had no access to management, compared with almost 50% of
male students (Ridge 2008). At this stage, it is not possible to make a clear judgment on the
role of leadership in affecting teacher quality. However, if one considers the characteristics
of transformational leadership, such as creating a shared vision, distributing leadership and
being active in the school, then it appears that these were less obvious in boys’ schools. On
the other hand, female teachers were explicitly dissatisfied with the quality of leadership
in their schools, suggesting that this is variable is perhaps not very useful in explaining the
differences between boys and girls education.
b) Access to resources
With respect to the adequacy of resources available to teachers, and how these affected
teaching quality, questions were asked regarding photocopying availability for teachers, as
well as whether students were asked for money by teachers or the school administration to
buy resources. The findings for the Ras Al Khaimah study showed that female teachers were
significantly (p =.001) more likely to have spent their own money on photocopying, with
100% of female teachers reporting that they had spent their own money on photocopying
while only 50% of males reported the same thing. In observations of lessons females were
much more likely to use additional classroom materials while males typically used only the
textbook (Ridge 2008). Ironically in boys’ schools, teachers were largely free to photocopy
whatever they liked according to their principal, while in girls’ schools, teachers were only
22 May 2010
allowed to use the school photocopiers for copying examinations. Therefore, despite
the limitations placed on female teachers with regards to access to school resources such
as the photocopier, they were still more likely to use photocopied materials than were
male teachers. This finding is interesting, as it means that it is not enough merely to
provide access to resources in order to improve the quality of teaching. Teachers need to
be willing and motivated to take advantage of such things in order for improvements in
teaching to be seen. The case could well be made for more availability of photocopying
facilities for female teachers, as they would be more likely to use them. In the case of
male teachers, access was not an issue, but they still failed to use what was there.
Female students were also more likely to be asked for money by a teacher or the
administration than male students (p=.007), reportedly for photocopying, pens and
other stationery (Ridge 2008). Having said this, girls’ schools in general were much more
pleasing to the eye in terms of classroom decoration and overall school appearance. As
stated above female teachers were observed to be using more worksheets and other
materials in the classroom, which were probably paid for by the teacher or the students.
The girls’ more positive rating of school resources might be linked to the fact that with
the combination of school, student, and teacher resources, there are better resources in
girls’ schools, but they come at a price to all involved.
In terms of how this affected teacher quality, again there were ambiguities. On one hand,
male teachers had more access to photocopiers and were not required to spend their
own money, unlike female teachers, whose photocopier use was restricted. On the other
hand, despite this restriction female teachers were much more likely to be observed using
additional materials and spending their own money, or the money of their students, on
purchasing needed resources. Male teachers were either unable or unwilling to go to the
same lengths, and appeared not to care very much about creativity in the classroom or
about how the classroom looked. Thus, with regard to teacher quality the availability or
lack of resources seemed to make little difference.
3. Institutional characteristics
Institutional characteristics are comprised of salary scales, terms and conditions of
employment, professional development opportunities, and promotion policies and
opportunities for teachers. All of these are set by the Ministry of Education or the Ministry
of Labor. Institutional factors are particularly salient in the case of the UAE, where there
are very different employment conditions for Emirati and expatriate teachers. Expatriate
teachers in the UAE are, in a very real sense, what other studies refer to as “contract”
(Vegas and De Laat 2003) teachers. In other countries, contract teachers are usually used
on a temporary basis when there are shortages of teachers, and consist of individuals
without specialized teacher training. By contrast, in the UAE, contract teachers are
imported from the wider Arab world, and are utilized as a fundamental component of
the nation’s education system. The implications of contract teachers on teaching quality
will be explored in the sections below.
a) Salary scales and terms of employment
The UAE Ministry of Education uses two different salary scales, one for Emiratis and one for
expatriates. Emiratis in the study in Ras Al Khaimah received on average AED 14,000 (US$
3,780) per month, while expatriate teachers received, on average, AED 7,000 (US$ 1,890) per
month (Ridge 2008). In addition to a substantially higher salary, Emirati teachers also received an
allowance per child, and housing allowances, which expatriate teachers did not.
Emirati teachers have all the benefits of a full-time public service job, including a high level
of job security and a generous pension scheme which they can access after only 25 years of
service. They can also request which school they want to teach in, and often transfer to schools
nearer to their homes; this is particularly the case with female teachers. In contrast, as stated
before and reflecting their temporary status, expatriate teachers are on one-year renewable
contracts, and can lose their jobs without any notice or compensation. As contract teachers
expatriate teachers typically cannot easily transfer schools on request; on the contrary, they
are often transferred to the most undesirable locations in the UAE. Many of them have to
commute long distances to remote schools or live with their families in small villages in order to
be near their place of work. They are also not eligible for a pension or retirement benefits, and
when they complete their term of service they have to leave the country.
b) Professional development policies
The Ministry of Education (MOE) provides a number of professional development (PD)

courses for all teachers, whether Emirati or expatriate. However, the quality of these
courses has not been rated very highly by teachers. Many of the male expatriate teachers
complained that these courses were not very relevant or useful, with one teacher describing
how he attended a session on maintaining an overhead projector (Ridge 2008). Male
English teachers, in particular, stated that they would like to receive more subject-specific
courses that involved pedagogical skills. However, there have been difficulties getting
expatriate male teachers to attend PD courses that occur outside of the school hours, even
when they are offered for free, this may be due to family commitments or that they may be
giving private lessons during these times.5 Similar to the situation with resources it seems it
is not enough to provide access to training there needs also to be a shift in perceptions by
expatriate males about their role as teachers and what is expected of them.
In addition to the professional development courses offered by the MOE, Emirati teachers
are eligible for a range of scholarships to pursue higher degrees through organizations such
as the Emirates Foundation, The Office of the President of the UAE and the Mohammed bin
Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation. This enables them to go abroad to study, or to take fee
paying courses in the UAE which will improve their teaching. Under the Madares Al Ghad
(“Schools of Tomorrow”) program, the MOE has also spent money on leadership training for
5
A local foundation in Ras Al Khaimah has been offering free professional development courses for any teacher
to attend, from public or private schools. The courses were advertised widely, with flyers distributed to every
school in the Emirate. Female teachers were in abundance both from public and private schools; however,
assistance was required from the MOE to attract male teachers.
24 May 2010
Emirati school principals; this training is not available to non-Emiratis. The status of the
expatriate teachers as contract teachers means that they are not seen to be a permanent
part of the system, and therefore receive little investment, despite the fact that many of
them have been teaching in the UAE for well over 20 years.
The end result is that while the MOE has spent money on some professional
development courses for all teachers, there are a range of additional opportunities
available to Emirati teachers that are simply not available to expatriate teachers. In
order to upgrade their teaching skills, expatriate teachers must spend their own money,
and since they typically have greater family demands, lower salaries and less intrinsic
motivation, this seems unlikely to happen. The skills of these teachers, therefore,
remain stagnant or at least lower than those teachers who have had access to more
training.
c) Promotion opportunities
Promotion opportunities are available to all Emirati teachers, and in particular to Emirati
males who, due to their small number, can easily expect to become a school principal
in a very short period of time. Female Emirati teachers also are able to become school
principals, but this involves a longer and more competitive process than for males. In
contrast, expatriate teachers cannot typically aspire to be a school principal or even a
deputy principal. They can be promoted to head of department, but that is where they
will likely stay for the duration of their career. The lack of promotion opportunities for
expatriate teachers is another de-motivating factor which cannot fail to have an impact on
how they see themselves in the UAE education system and, ultimately, on how they teach.
Table 3 below provides an overview of the institutional differences between Emiratis

and expattriate teachers
Table 3: Institutional dif ferences bet ween Emirati and expatriate teachers (2007)
EMIRATI TEACHER EXPATRIATE TEACHER

CHARACTERISTICS
(SECONDARY) (SECONDARY)
Minimum monthly salary AED 14,000 AED 7,000

(average)
Contract duration Indefinite One year renewable
Additional benefits Housing and child allowance, None
pension, job security
Ability to request transfer Yes No
Training opportunities Eligible for free/subsidized Only MOE courses
master’s and doctoral degrees,
all MOE-run courses
Promotion opportunities Yes, all the way to principal Very limited
4. Cumulative impact of background, school and institutional characteristics on
teacher quality and student achievement
The cumulative impact of background, school and institutional characteristics on teacher quality
at the classroom level, as described above, was evidenced in the teacher observations and student
achievement in the study in Ras Al Khaimah (Ridge 2008). The teacher observations in Ras Al Khaimah
examined the quality of teaching on a teacher-by-teacher basis at each of the eight schools in the
study, and were then aggregated to look at overall differences between male and female teachers.
The results of the teacher observations supported the finding that female teachers, both Emirati and
expatriate, are more competent than their male counterparts. The teacher observations found that
there was a significant (p = .02) difference in teaching quality between male teachers and female
teachers, with female teachers having, on average, higher ratings than male teachers (Ridge 2008).
In addition to the observation data, student achievement data for the students taught by these
teachers also revealed differences in achievement between males and females. It can be seen in
Figure 2 below that the largest difference in student achievement is in math, while the smallest
difference is in biology.
When the achievement data for students of the teachers in the Ras Al Khaimah study were
compared to the data from the teacher observations6 using a Mann-Whitney U test, it was found
that there was a significant (p = .001) difference overall, with students (girls) taught by women
scoring on average 73%, and students (boys) taught by men scoring 67% across the four subjects
(Ridge 2008).
On an Emirate-wide level, data on both the pass rates of boys relative to girls and the dropout rates
of boys relative to girls also shows vast disparities, with boys more likely to drop out of school and
pass at rates less than girls for the majority of subjects (MOE 2007-08). At the country level, the
gap between boys and girls also stands, with girls outperforming boys on the CEPA English exams
(NAPO 2009). Finally, the 2007 TIMSS study conducted in the Emirate of Dubai also found girls
outperforming boys in Math and Science in government schools (Helal 2009).
Figure 2: Grade 10 -12 student achievement by subject and gender for eight
schools in Ras Al Khaimah
100.00 Source: Ridge 2008
90.00 Male Female
80.00 75
73 73
68 70
66 67 67
70.00
60.00
50.00
Biology Math English Geography
5
These were based on an instrument modified from an earlier one by Shacter and Thum (2003), and used 12
teaching performance standards: content, lesson objectives, presentation, structure and pacing, activities, questions,
feedback, grouping, thinking, motivating, environment, and teacher knowledge of students. Each teacher received a
score from 1 to 6 for each of these categories, with 1 being highly ineffective and 6 being exemplary.
26 May 2010
Intersections of Gender, Nationality and Teacher Quality
From the evidence above, it is clear that there is a difference between male and female
teachers. Ultimately, it did not matter for female students whether their teacher was
Emirati or expatriate, as they scored higher on exams and were more likely to remain in
school than males. The poor quality of teaching observed in male teachers appears to
stem from two main factors which have interacted to create a problem that is rapidly
spiraling out of control. The first of these is the issue of working conditions related to
being contract teachers, and the second revolves around the quality and background
characteristics of these expatriate teachers.
a) Conditions of contract teachers

Male teachers in the UAE are overwhelmingly expatriate teachers, with estimates of
up to 80% of male teachers being from outside the UAE. These teachers are, as stated
before, in essence, contract teachers, meaning that they have less job security, lower
salaries, fewer benefits and limited promotion opportunities compared to Emirati
teachers. In addition to this, male expatriate teachers are more likely to be the sole
wage earners, supporting typically not only their immediate but also their extended
family. Therefore, they have more expectations placed upon them then their female
counterparts. The combination of a low wage, high job insecurity, poor promotion
possibilities and heavy demands from their families means that male teachers are highly
incentivized to make as much money as they can in the time they are in the UAE. These
teachers, therefore, will actively look for additional employment opportunities, such
as giving private tuition to their own and other students, and/or undertaking other
kinds of wage supplementing employment such as driving taxis in the evening (Lewis
and Shaeen 2010). As the current assessment system used by government schools
and private Arabic schools is based on memorization, private tuition lessons require no
additional teaching skills, just an ability to drill students. There is, however, a heavy cost
to the educational system arising from teachers undertaking additional employment.
This is manifested in teachers not covering all the content material in class, or giving
unequal assistance to students, or being physically exhausted and unable to fulfill their
teaching duties. Ultimately, though, it is the students who suffer most as a result of
these activties.
b) The quality of contract teachers

The study in Ras Al Khaimah found that male teachers were less student-centered and
less pedagogically skilled than their female counterparts. When a country such as the
UAE has to import large numbers of teachers to staff its schools, the assumption that
the imported teachers bring adequate skills with them is not always correct. The three
main countries from which the UAE brings its teachers are Egypt, Jordan and Syria.
In these countries student achievement in math and science is very low. In 8th grade
math, Jordanian students ranked 31st, Syrian students 37th and Egyptian students at
38th out of 47 countries on the 2007 TIMSS. This gives an indication that the education
systems in these countries are not providing high quality graduates in the first place. A
recent article on the Egyptian education system described it as failing a whole generation
of students, the article emphasized the poor quality of the system and the sporadic
attendance of teachers who are more interested in giving private lessons (Bradley 2010).
Those entering the teaching profession in these countries are therefore unlikely to be the
top students. As in most Arab countries, teachers tend to be from the lower end of the
graduating cohort, with the top performing students entering medicine, engineering or
other more lucrative fields (Hartman 2008).
The starting pool of potential recruits for education is therefore already woefully deficient.
The poor quality of students entering teacher education programs in these countries is
then exacerbated by equally deficient teacher education programs. One area of critical
significance which has been discussed is the lack of a practicum component, absent in
most teacher training programs in the Arab world, outside of the Gulf. This lack of a
practicum component means that even those with education degrees are ill-equipped for
the challenges and reality of the classroom. Unfortunately, many of the teachers that are
brought to the UAE do not have an education degree, but are instead subject specialists.
These recruits have no pedagogical training at all, and those in the Ras Al Khaimah study
stated that they were promised training when they were recruited but that this never
materialized (Ridge, 2008). The lack of attention to whom is being recruited, and from
where, means that the UAE is depending on teachers who will simply be unable to give
national students the type of education that the country needs and wants.
28 May 2010
Conclusions and Implications for Policy Makers
The general level of teacher quality in the UAE cannot be said to be among the best in the
world; however, stark differences have emerged between male and female teachers. In
the case of the UAE, differences in teachers have split along gender lines due to the rapid
expansion of work and teacher education opportunities for Emirati women. This, coupled
with an acute shortage of Emirati men in the education profession, has left the secondary
boys’ schools in particular dependant upon male, expatriate teachers. These teachers have
been found to be less effective in the classroom, and to have inadequate pedagogical skills.
When coupled with the unequal and de-motivating working conditions, it is clear that these
teachers will be either unable or unwilling to assist in the creation of a knowledge-based,
critical thinking national work force.
Education policy makers in the UAE need to start thinking about the heavy cost of
a number of decisions regarding teachers, which are having a cumulatively negative
impact on the quality of boys’ education. There needs to be a complete overhaul
of the way in which male, expatriate teachers are selected and inducted, and there
needs to be additional pedagogical training provided for them to compensate for
their lack of skills in this area. It may also be worth rethinking the countries that
have traditionally been sources of male teachers, and perhaps looking elsewhere
to countries like Oman, which currently has an oversupply of comparatively better
trained and more culturally similar teachers. Employment contracts for expatriate
teachers need to be for longer periods of time in order to create some semblance
of job security, and measures need to be taken to reduce the amount of private
tuition or other additional employment undertaken by government school teachers,
as this is creating further inefficiencies in the system.
A non-financial incentive scheme could be introduced to motivate expatriate

teachers to work and to deliver results in the form of better student achievement
and reduced dropout rates. Teachers could be rewarded for example for keeping
students in school, for value added to student performance, and for being involved
in extracurricular activities. There are already some expatriate teachers who go
above and beyond to help their students, and they should be encouraged and
supported. It is vital that expatriate teachers feel that they are a valued part of
the system, rather than merely temporary workers. These teachers should also be
subjected to the same high expectations as their students. Through rewarding
those teachers who are excellent, and through demanding more from those who
currently delivering very little, positive gains could be realized quickly.
Parents also need to be engaged to support the schools and teachers in demanding
higher standards from their children. Part of the problem that teachers and
school principals have mentioned is a lack of support from parents, often around
disciplinary matters (Ridge 2008). Schools need to work more closely with parents
so that they know how their child is performing at school on a regular basis and
work with them to help to improve student performance. Through better and more
frequent communication with parents, both students and teachers gain.
Increasing the number of Emirati males in the education sector is also important, but
this will require a radical rethinking of how teachers are selected and remunerated in
the UAE in general. In short, unless drastic changes are soon implemented regarding
expatriate teachers the UAE will continue to see boys underperforming, low male
tertiary enrolment rates and increasing numbers of unsatisfied male youth who have
not reached their potential as vital and important members of Emirati society. The life
choices that some of these disenfranchised youth may make should be of concern to
all who live in the UAE.
30 May 2010
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Working Paper No.

Teacher Quality, Gender and Nationality

A Crisis for Boys

Teacher Quality, Gender and Nationality

Dubai School of Government

Author: Natasha Ridge

Natasha Ridge is a Research Fellow at the Dubai School of Government.

Abstract ..... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6. .

The UAE Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9

Teacher Gender and Student Achievement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11

Teacher Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12

a) Background characteristics . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 ....

b) School characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14 ....

c) Institutional characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15 ....

Examining Teacher Quality in the UAE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

1. Background characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16 ....

a) Nationality and gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16 ....

b) Years of experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17 ....

c) Teacher education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18 ....

d) Family demands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21....

2. School characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .21

a) Leadership quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 ....

b) Access to resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 ....

3. Institutional characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23 ....

a) Salary scales and terms of employment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24 ....

b) Professional development policies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .24 ....

c) Promotion opportunities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25 ....

4. Cumulative impact of background, school and institutional

Intersections of Gender, Nationality and Teacher Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

a) Conditions of contract teachers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

b) The quality of contract teachers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

Conclusions and Implications for Policy Makers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29

In terms of student attitudes, the evidence is also inconclusive. A study of seven- to

In the study in Ras Al Khaimah (Ridge 2008), which surveyed 32 teachers in 8

Teacher education in the UAE

In terms of the program requirements at UAEU, students have to complete a required

The Higher Colleges of Technology offer four bachelor-level degrees: a Bachelor

Finally, Zayed University offers two undergraduate degree programs: a Bachelor of

Teacher education and certification in Egypt, Syria and Jordan

DEGREE PRE-PRACTICUM SUPERVISED PASSING A COMPLETION OF COMPLETION OF

Egypt 38 Yes No Yes No No No

Table 2: Requirements for becoming a middle/lower secondary grade science teacher

DEGREE PRE-PRACTICUM SUPERVISED PASSING A COMPLETION OF COMPLETION OF

Egypt 41 Yes No No Yes No No

In summary, according to the 2007 TIMSS Encyclopedia, the requirements to be a

Finally, an important but somewhat overlooked characteristic of expatriate teachers

b) Professional development policies

The Ministry of Education (MOE) provides a number of professional development (PD)

Table 3 below provides an overview of the institutional differences between Emiratis

EMIRATI TEACHER EXPATRIATE TEACHER

Minimum monthly salary AED 14,000 AED 7,000

90.00 Male Female

a) Conditions of contract teachers

b) The quality of contract teachers

A non-financial incentive scheme could be introduced to motivate expatriate

Stateuniversity.com. 2010. United Arab Emirates: Teaching profession.

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