An exchange of visits this month between Virginia Tech and Saudi Arabia's King Abdulaziz University (KAU) culminated in a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), slated for signing later this spring.

Ongoing discussions linking the two universities in the areas of distance and distributed learning (eLearning) and engineering were established by Sedki Riad, professor of electrical engineering and director of International Programs in Virginia Tech's College of Engineering, and Tom Wilkinson, director of Virginia Tech's Institute for Distance and Distributed Learning (IDDL). Both faculty members traveled to Saudia Arabia for KAU's conference on reshaping higher education, attended by more than 2,000 people from countries in the gulf region. Wilkinson opened the conference with his presentation, "New Knowledge for the Global Community." Riad also addressed the gathering with his presentation, "Restructuring Educational Programs through eLearning."

Following the conference, KAU's Vice President of Development Salem Sahab visited Blacksburg and met with key Virginia Tech personnel to see first hand what instructors can do with eLearning technology. Sahab earned both a master's and a Ph.D. from Colorado State University. He is scheduled to return to Blacksburg this spring and will be joined by KAU's President Osama Sadik Abdul-Rahman Tayeb for the scheduled MOU signing. Tayeb earned his Ph.D. in Pharmacology from Vanderbilt University.

KAU is a comprehensive campus-based public university in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, with 12 colleges including engineering, medicine and allied sciences, arts and humanity, and marine science. Its women's campus, also located in Jeddah, will participate in the collaboration as well. KAU is committed to maintaining strong relationships with educational and research institutions and businesses and industries around the world including the University of Michigan, Northwestern University, University of California, Berkeley, University of Washington, Harvard, University of British Columbia, University of Nantes in France, and others.

Much like the United States, Saudi Arabia is experiencing higher education institutional capacity issues. At present, the Kingdom can serve only 75,000 of its 200,000 high school graduates. As Saudi Arabia's first university to use distance education as an instructional strategy, KAU serves 20,000 home-study students. With Virginia Tech's assistance in developing an eLearning strategic plan and structuring a Deanship for Distance Learning, they plan to serve 50,000 to 60,000 distance learning students by 2010.

As a first step, 60 KAU faculty members will arrive in Blacksburg this summer for a series of professional development activities that will be developed and delivered by Virginia Tech's English Department, Communications Department, Faculty Development Institute, the Institute for Distance and Distributed Learning, and the English Language Institute. KAU faculty will participate in two of four planned development programs: 1) English instruction, 2) communications instruction, 3) basic and intermediate computer and web skill development, and 4) designing, developing and delivering eLearning courses. Family members accompanying KAU faculty also will have an opportunity to participate in activities at the English Language Institute.

Founded in 1872 as a land-grant college, Virginia Tech has grown to become among the largest universities in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Today, Virginia Tech's eight colleges are dedicated to putting knowledge to work through teaching, research, and outreach activities and to fulfilling its vision to be among the top research universities in the nation. At its 2,600-acre main campus located in Blacksburg and other campus centers in Northern Virginia, Southwest Virginia, Hampton Roads, Richmond, and Roanoke, Virginia Tech enrolls more than 28,000 full- and part-time undergraduate and graduate students from all 50 states and more than 100 countries in 180 academic degree programs.

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