Sustainable Human Resource Development in Education for an Expatriate Dependent Education Sector in UAE

Abstract

In UAE, the public and private education sectors are dominated by foreign labour. At the same time, participation of locals in the sector is also very low despite the socio-cultural needs and implications of education. This research evaluates the challenge of local human resource development in the Abu Dhabi department of education. The research utilizing a mixed method surveys teachers and education sector practitioners. The study conducted questionnaire survey and interview with respondents who are responsible to education sector. The study found that satisfaction with supervisor is ranked the highest factors in job satisfaction group of human resource domain. While the correlation analysis found that perception of organizational career support (OCS) have significant impacts on an individual’s overall job satisfaction. In term of interview results, it found that at the leadership level, interest in localization of human resource in gradually diminishing with importance of local teachers in the educational processes being considered increasingly unnecessary. For teachers, the prevailing perspective is that having local teachers can significantly add value to learners. This study recommends enhanced focus on localization of the education sector without too much emphasis on language proficiency.