72,000 Saudi female graduates apply for just 5,000 education posts

A Saudi Arabian government jobs recruitment site crashed over the weekend after being flooded with 72,000 job applications for just 5,000 female teaching roles.

The kingdom’s Ministry of Education has been forced to extend the deadline by two days for jobs in the education sector after a glitch on the Jadarah employment portal prevented graduates from applying before the Sunday cut-off day.

Applicants complained that the site froze and was rejecting any new applications. The ministry has now extended the deadline until Tuesday.

The Ministry of Civil Service reported the total number of women applicants for the Ministry of Education reached 72,542., but only posted listings for 5,523 vacant positions for women teachers  in various parts of the country.

None of the available positions were in the main cities of Riyadh, Jeddah or Mecca.

The application process started on Wednesday and was to continue for a week. The available positions included teaching jobs in kindergartens (691), primary schools (1,458), middle schools (1,792) and high schools (1,582).

The unemployment rate in Saudi Arabia currently stands at around 11 per cent. The majority of the kingdom’s population is aged under 30 and recent reports suggested that out of 1.5 million unemployed people, 300,000 hold a bachelors degree.

The ministry’s spokesman Hamdan Al-Muneif said that the number of applicants increases disproportionately each year in comparison to the actual number of educational jobs available.