A Blended Learning Model Used to Prepare Saudi Arabian Doctoral Students to be Knowledge-Based Educational Leaders

ABSTRACT: To secure a better future in today’s globalized world, a knowledge-based society must be a priority for every nation. For a long time, many nations have relied primarily on passive resources—that is, natural and financial resources—for their existence. However, in the era of globalization dominated by knowledge and information technologies, the focus is shifting towards active resources—that is, human resources. Human resources are perceived by nations as a key engine for competitiveness, economic prosperity, national sovereignty, and human dignity. One of the media through which these human resources are developed is education, which involves teaching and learning. To respond to the increased demands for human competencies to function in a knowledge-based society, educators must adapt to the emerging teaching and learning approaches. One of these emerging approaches is the blended learning approach, which has the ability to improve learning and cost-effectiveness, increase access and flexibility, and help institutions stay up-to-date. Therefore, in contrast to a traditional research paper, this paper describes a teaching and learning practice, with the aim of achieving two objectives: 1) to present a brief background of the blended learning approach and its models and 2) to share a specific blended learning model used to prepare Saudi Arabian doctoral students to be knowledge-based educational leaders. KEYWORDS: blended learning, educational leaders, knowledge-based, Saudi Arabi