January 17th, 2020
On January 7, 2020, Morocco’s Ministry of National Education, Vocation, Training, Higher Education, and Scientific Research announced that it will adopt a Bachelor system for high education as of September 2020. This means that it is switching from the Licence, Master, Doctorat (LMD) system which is mainly used in Francophone countries, to the bachelor degree system used in the Anglophone world. Moroccan universities will adopt a transition period before completely implementing the new system.
The LMD system, especially, the three-year Licence was seen by the Ministry as lacking in critical thinking skills and not sufficient enough for students to acquire a strong educational background. Morocco’s switch to the Anglophone degree model is to help broaden access and prepare its young people for a competitive global market where English is the lingua franca.
Here are 5 quick facts you need to know about Morocco’s transition to the Bachelor degree system:
- Students in their first academic year in September 2020 will be the only ones affected by the change, while those who are in the second year or higher will continue their studies according to the current LMD system.
- The new Bachelor degree will be a four-year program and expected to provide students with soft skills and strengthen their learning of foreign languages and information technology.
- French remains the language used in the teaching of all scientific and technical university courses. In secondary schools, French is also starting to replace Arabic in the teaching of scientific and technical subjects.
- Discussion are underway on how to train Moroccan teachers in the English language, especially teachers of scientific disciplines such as mathematics, physics, and chemistry.
- The Minister of Education announced the following three projects: 1) a cooperation between Morocco and the UK to establish an English language training program for 20,000 teachers of non-linguistic subjects; 2) a project to increase the teaching of English in Morocco with the opening of British schools; 3) and the signing of agreements between Moroccan and British universities.
Sources:
The Academic Credentials Evaluation Institute, Inc. (ACEI), was founded in 1994 and is based in Los Angeles, CA, USA. ACEI provides a number of services that include evaluations of international academic credentials for U.S. educational equivalence, translation, verification, and professional training programs. ACEI is a Charter and Endorsed Member of the Association of International Credential Evaluators. For more information, visit www.acei-global.org.