The purpose of this study is to provide an analysis of recent education reform policies related to the so-called knowledge economy (KE) in the Middle East, and the role of educational technology in the reform process. The study takes the Gulf Arab state of Bahrain as a case study through which to view and comment upon many of the features common to these reforms elsewhere in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Several commentators have pointed out that these policy reforms have tended to share common ambitions, from the perspective of the respective governments and other key actors, notably the global information technology (IT) conglomerates and the supra-national organisations (SNO), such as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the World Bank (WB), and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). These common features include: the promotion of skills and competencies associated with educational technology across school curricula; the development of e-Learning in and out of the classroom; aspirations for the learners to develop the skills necessary for them to be successful participants in the KE, both as future employees and as citizens (Dale 2000; Robertson 2006; Zhao et al. 2006; Rizvi and Lingard 2010).

The successful implementation of educational technology in schools has, therefore, come to be seen by both the SNO and the national governments as a key element in modernisation and reform of education. Indeed, even within the limited education budgets of late developing countries (LDCs) with fragile economies, there has been a significant investment in computers and educational technology infrastructure in schools, in the belief that the machines will serve to transform what and how teachers teach and learners learn and therefore transform the economic, cultural, and societal bases of nations as they progress into the twenty-first century (El-Tawila et al. 2000; Jensen and Lauritsen 2005; Kozma 2005). Educational technology has pride of place within the twenty-first-century skill agenda (Facer 2011), which is driving much of the educational discourse about the KE, and is therefore a global policy concern of contemporary times (Ball 1998; Gabbard 2000; OECD 2010)

Rather than accepting the underlying assumptions about technology-led reform of educational and economic fortunes, a significant body of writers and commentators (Cuban 2001; Warschauer 2004; Apple 2004; Monahan 2005; Selwyn 2010a) have questioned the relationship between government policy making, investments in educational technology, and the learning outcomes in schools and classrooms. These critics have identified a number of areas of tension that are becoming evident from a critical global policy perspective, not least:

This research challenges the ambitions underlying the education reform policies in respect of educational technology in the countries of the Middle East; the factors that influence the success of the policy implementation; the impact on teaching and learning in schools; the quality of the learner experience; and the influence upon educational outcomes. As such, the narrative explores the disparity that exists between the rhetoric of the much-heralded information revolution in schools and the reality of day-to-day custom and practice in most classrooms, and endeavours to identify some underlying reasons and common features in the Middle East region.

The investigation uses the countries of Bahrain and Jordan as points of reference since their educational technology reform policies and programmes share many common features. These two countries are significant, not least because of their shared belief that investment in educational technology in schools will stimulate the development of a highly skilled and information-literate workforce to promote the KE. The King Hamad School for the Future (KHSF) project, in Bahrain, borrowed heavily upon the rhetoric surrounding the Jordan Education Reform for the Knowledge Economy (ERfKE) project, which was launched at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in 2003 and was underwritten by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). Bahrain and Jordan share ostensibly similar education technology and policy ambitions, but each is at a different stage of economic and pedagogic development, and each has different imperatives. Jordan has a relatively (in MENA terms) high-performing education system (OECD 2010), yet is a relatively low-income nation with few natural resources to bolster its gross domestic product (GDP); Bahrain, by contrast, is a small, wealthy rentier state, with poorly performing schools (Barber and Mourshed 2010). As a country, it was one of the first to exploit its oil reserves in 1932, and, regionally, it has the urgent need to develop a post-oil economy as the reserves have been beginning to dwindle since the onset of the third millennium.

A common ambition for both states, therefore, is to develop their education systems to produce high-calibre potential “knowledge workers” and to diversify their economies so that their GDPs become less dependent upon revenues from natural resources (most notably oil) and more upon the social and intellectual capital of its people. The ten-year two-phase ERfKE project in Jordan is an example of a comprehensive and ambitious project to address many of the existing shortcomings of the education system in that country, not only through an investment in educational technology in schools but also through a corresponding overhaul of the curriculum. Similarly, the KHSF project, which was launched in 11 pilot schools in the Kingdom of Bahrain in 2005 with a plan for a national rollout by 2010, had an ambition, at its launch, to promote the development of the “knowledge workers” of tomorrow.

Despite the transformative ambitions of these programmes, it could be argued that relatively little change has occurred in the everyday activities in schools in either of these two states. In practice, as published school inspection and review reports and evaluations make clear, classroom practice for most teachers in most schools has remained unchanged for most of the time (QAAET 2010). In the majority of cases, the educational technology implementations have seldom moved far beyond teachers using data projectors and IWBs—what David Buckingham (Buckingham 2010: 6) has termed “the wasteland of spread sheet, file management and instrumental training that constitutes most ‘information technology’ courses in schools.” In this light, it could be argued that in Bahrain, and also in Jordan, the country upon which the KHSF is modelled, students are experiencing a phenomenon common to many education systems where the rhetoric of educational technology policies is simply failing to be realised on the ground.

However, viewing this apparent “failure” of educational technology overlooks many of the complex political, economic, social, and cultural issues at play at the different levels of analysis—from macro-level issues of supra-national educational governance to micro-level issues of religion and local cultures. It is evident that the educational technology policies are part of a much wider education reform agenda relating to twenty-first-century skills and the KE. This report of the research project, therefore, seeks to look beyond a straightforward assertion that educational technologies are “not working” as they should.

Through an analysis of the policy documents, followed by interviews and focus groups with the principal actors in this analytical narrative, the study therefore aims to clarify the complex factors underpinning the formulation of government technology in education policies and the ways in which the policies are being enacted.