An Integrated Framework for Aligning Saudi Higher Education Policies with Future Economy Requirements through Artificial Intelligence Transformation

Abstract

The fast growth of artificial intelligence (AI) and digital transformations has resulted in some changes and increased expectations for alignment of higher education systems in terms of institutional policies, curriculum structures, assessments, and governance processes to future economic needs. In Saudi Arabia, despite Vision 2030 focusing on development of future-oriented competencies and knowledge capabilities, there are still some difficulties with coherent alignment of educational policies, AI, faculty readiness and sustainable implementation of them. The purpose of this research is to offer an integrated approach to the alignment of  Saudi higher education policies to future economy requirements with the help of AI transformation. Explanatory mixed methods design was used that included analysis of policy documents, validated stakeholder survey, and semi-structured interviews. For data collection, 111 higher education stakeholders were involved. IBM SPSS Statistics 30 was used for quantitative data analysis including descriptive statistics, reliability analysis, correlation analysis, t-tests and ANOVAThe results showed that integration difficulties of AI had a very high perception with a mean of 4.63 and relative importance of 92.63%. The biggest challenge identified was difficulty of assessing the efficacy of the AI in delivering learning outcomes (mean = 4.88, 97.66%), followed by deficiency in technology competencies among the students (mean = 4.86, 97.30%). Barriers to integrating the philosophy of education with AI technologies scored an average of 4.85 (97.03%), with redesigning curriculum as the most prominent barrier (mean = 4.95, 98.92%). The proposed pedagogical approaches garnered high agreement with an average of 4.98 (99.62%). Testing for reliability indicated high internal consistency with Cronbach’s alpha ranging from 0.894 to 0.952. No significant difference was found on gender, qualifications, academic status, or experience levels. It is concluded that effective use of AI for transforming education will require policy reforms that will combine innovative curriculum design, quality assessment, professional  development, and good governance for economic preparedness in the future.