From the Decline in Admissions at the College of Sharia to Questions About the Future (1)
In November 2025, we wrote about the Faculty of Sharia, not merely as a university college performing an educational function, but as a scholarly institution whose role is intertwined with the identity and intellectual and value-based formation of society. Today, the issue has resurfaced with greater urgency: What does the decline in enrollment in the college reveal about its image in the eyes of the new generation? After admissions to the Faculty of Sharia hovered around 600 students in some years, they dropped to fewer than 300 in 2026, a decrease approaching 50%. The point is not to dwell on the number itself, but to reflect on the implications it may conceal; university statistics do not speak for themselves and require reading between the lines.
First: When does a number become a question? Does the decline in admissions mean that our children have turned away from Islamic sciences? It would be unfair to rush to this conclusion. When a student faces university choices, he is not merely selecting a major; he is choosing years of his life and placing part of his future in that decision. Therefore, he asks—and it is his right to ask: What will I do after graduation? What doors will this degree open for me? Can I develop in this field? Does this study offer more than one path? These are not materialistic questions that diminish the value of knowledge, but questions about the future. Hence, a more precise question might be: Why does the student no longer see a clear future in studying Sharia, to the same extent that he sees it in other majors?
Second: The student is not fleeing from knowledge; he is seeking horizons. The student may love Islamic sciences, take pride in them, and wish to study them, but when comparing one major to another, he does not look only at the lecture hall; he looks beyond it. Here, the labor market enters the university choice decision through a door we often fail to see. The student looks at employment, career paths, development opportunities, and the nature of work before making his decision. If he finds that one major opens multiple doors while another appears more limited, it is natural for him to recalculate. It is therefore erroneous to interpret the decline in enrollment in the Faculty of Sharia as a decline in the value of Islamic sciences among youth. The issue may be simpler and deeper at once: The student may not have turned away from Sharia itself, but from the image in which he sees the future of Sharia graduates. This is where the real problem begins.
Third: When the image of the major narrows. Islamic sciences are far broader than the narrow professional image that may be associated with them in some minds. They intersect with law and judiciary, economics and Islamic finance, education, family and society, media, scientific research, public policies, ethics of professions and technology, and other fields that require Islamic grounding and awareness of values. However, the breadth of the academic field is not enough on its own. The question we must ask frankly is: Does this academic breadth correspond to a similar expansion in graduates’ horizons? If the answer is not clear to the student, we should not be surprised if he seeks another major that appears clearer to him. In this case, the issue is no longer merely about the attractiveness of the college, but becomes a matter of an integrated relationship between: education, profession, and future.
Fourth: When employment speaks on behalf of the major. We cannot separate the image of the major from the career paths the student sees before him. The wider the doors open for a graduate of a certain major, the more attractive it becomes. Conversely, whenever a student feels that doors previously open to graduates of his major are narrowing or becoming less clear, this affects his decision. Therefore, any discussion about the future of the Faculty of Sharia should not begin with the question: How can we increase the number of admitted students? But with an earlier question: What future are we offering the student if he chooses Sharia? Increasing admissions by administrative decree does not create genuine interest, nor should the decline in numbers be met with indifference. Genuine interest is not created by increasing seats, but by enhancing the attractiveness of the future awaiting the student after graduation.
Fifth: The number is not the problem, but it is a warning. One might say: Is enrollment not a planning matter? Is the university not required to align student numbers with societal needs and the labor market? The answer is yes, but we must distinguish between a calculated decline resulting from clear academic planning, and a decline that reflects a loss of the major’s attractiveness in the eyes of students. The former is a planning decision; the latter is an indicator that should be read before it turns into a trend. Prestigious institutions do not wait until the problem becomes a permanent reality; they read indicators at their onset. The Faculty of Sharia is not just a number in admission tables; it is a scholarly institution with its own history, role, and mission. Therefore, the question about declining enrollment is, in essence, a question about its ability to continue fulfilling this role in a time when both student needs and the labor market have changed.
Who will protect the future? We do not need to defend the college merely for the sake of defending it, nor do we need to issue a hasty verdict against it. What we need is something braver: to ask the college, to ask the university, and to ask ourselves: What do we want for the Faculty of Sharia in the coming years? We want it to preserve the authenticity of its knowledge without isolating itself from the questions of the era. We want the student to enter it because he finds solid knowledge, broad horizons, and a future in which he can build himself and serve his country. Preserving Islamic sciences is not achieved by distancing them from life’s questions, but by making them more capable of answering them. Hence, the decline in enrollment is not the end of the story, but an opportunity to open a serious discussion about the college’s future. But if the student has begun to recalculate, who is responsible for the environment that made him reconsider his choice? This is the question we will attempt to answer in the second article.
Al-Zubdah
1. The decline in admissions to the Faculty of Sharia is not a passing number, but an indicator deserving of analysis of its implications and causes before it becomes a permanent trend.
2. The decline in enrollment does not necessarily mean youth are turning away from Islamic sciences; the student may love the major but is seeking a clearer professional future.
3. The student does not choose his major in isolation from the labor market; the image of employment and future career paths has become an essential part of the university choice decision.
4. Islamic sciences are too broad to be reduced to a single career path, and the challenge lies in translating this academic breadth into clear academic and professional horizons.
5. The real question is not: How many students will the Faculty of Sharia admit? But: How can we make the student see authentic knowledge and a future worth choosing in it?
Dr. Abdulhamid Al-Shaigi
