The Higher Education and Scientific Research Ministry will bring forward a bill to create an agency to support foreign students, Minister Moncef Boukthir said Sunday. “The bill is being finalised,” he added.
The ministry is endeavouring to attract more foreign students, notably Africans, Boukthir further said as he chaired the International Student Day organised annually by the University of Monastir, in the presence of several presidents of Arab universities and Tunisian and foreign students. Agreements involving 42 African countries were inked to this end.
The ministry is not opposed to the idea of increasing the number of foreign medical students, Boukthir said, but there is need to comply with a numner of standards to preserve the value of the Tunisian degree.
Quality education in Tunisian universities is a strategic goal, the minister said. It is within this framework that the National Agency for the Evaluation and Accreditation of Higher Education Institutions and Research Centres was created in June 2022.
“Several academic institutions won international accreditation. This is an approach adopted by the ministry and its various structures to uphold the spirit of openness advocated by the country,” he said.
Secretary General of the Association of Arab Universities Amr Ezzat Salama told TAP the International Student Day is a “beautiful activity” that demonstrates the openness of the State and Tunisian universities to various cultures.
Foreign students from Mauritania, Nigeria, Cote d’Ivoire, Congo, Guinea and Palestine attended the event. They unanimously highlighted the importance of this Student Day.
This event is an opportunity to shed further light on the Palestinian culture that the Israeli occupation is trying to erase and to discover other cultures, said President of the General Union of Palestinian Students-Tunis office Muhammad Sweiti,

Source: Agence Tunis Afrique Presse (TAP)