We, as the Iranians, most likely consider the leaders of the USA, Russia, the UK, Germany, France, and of course Iran among some top leaders of the world. The educational backgrounds of those leaders may be summarized as follows:
Barack Obama (USA)
1. St. Francis Assisi Catholic in Jakarta, Indonesia from first through third grade
2. State Elementary School Menteng 01 in Jakarta, Indonesia for the fourth grade
3. Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaii from the fifth grade through the 12th grade where he received his high school diploma.
4. Occidental College in Los Angeles, California for his freshmen and sophomore year, but transferred to Columbia University
5. Columbia University in New York City, New York for his junior and senior year. He received his bachelor of arts in which he majored in Political Science with international relations.
6. Harvard Law School in Cambridge, Mass. for a three-year program. He received his J.D. magna cum laude.
Dmitry Medvedev (Russia)
Medvedev’s father was a Professor at the Leningrad Institute of Technology. As a schoolboy, Dmitry Medvedev always liked chemistry and even dreamed of becoming a great chemist, like Mendeleev. But this was not to be. He attended the Law Faculty of Saint Petersburg State University, the same one that Lenin and Putin graduated from. Medvedev received a Bachelor’s law degree in 1987 and a PhD in law in 1990. For the next nine years he lectured at his Alma Mater combining his teaching activities with local politics.
David Cameron (UK)
David Cameron enjoyed a very traditional upbringing. He went to the no-longer existing Heatherdown School, also frequented by the princes Andrew and Edward. Subsequently, David went to Eton and then Oxford. From 1985 to 1988, after a three-month internship at a parent’s company in Hong Kong, Cameron studied philosophy, politics and economics (PPE) in Oxford. David finished his PPE with a “first class degree”.
Angela Merkel (Germany)
She was educated in Templin and at the University of Leipzig, where she studied physics from 1973 to 1978. While a student, Angela Merkel participated in the reconstruction of the ruin of the Moritzbastei, a project that students initiated to create their own club and recreation facility on campus. Such an initiative was unprecedented in Germany at the timr, and initially resisted by the University of Leipzig. However, with backing of the local leadership of the Social Democratic Party, the project was allowed to proceed. Merkel worked and studied at the Central Institute for Physical Chemistry of the Academy of Sciences in Berlin-Adlershof from 1978 to 1990. She learned to speak Russian fluently, and earned a statewide prize for her proficiency. After being awarded a doctorate degree for her thesis on quantum chemistry she worked as a researcher.
Nicolas Sarkozy (France)
Nicolas Sarkozy completed his education first from the Lycee Chaptal School and after that from catholic school named Cours Saint –Louis de Monceau. Nicolas Sarkozy got his masters degree in private law and DEA degree in business law from the Paris X Nanterre University. After doing the graduation Nicolas Sarkozy e got admission in the institute of Detudes politics but there Nicolas Sarkozy failed because of bad command in English. Finally Nicolas Sarkozy became a lawyer who is specialized in business and family law.
Ali Khamenei (Iran)
He attended religious studies classes at the rudimentary and advanced levels in the Hawza of Mashhad, under his mentors such as Haj Sheikh Hashem Ghazvini, and Ayatollah Milani, and then went to Najaf in 1957. After a short stay he left Najaf to Mashhad, and in 1958 he settled in Qom. Khamenei attended the classes of Ayatollahs Husain Borujerdi and Ruhollah Khomeini. Khamenei is fluent in both Persian and Arabic. He has translated several books into Persian from Arabic, including the works of the famous Egyptian Islamist theoretician Sayyid Qutb. He is a less fluent speaker of the Azerbaijani language, his father’s mother language and has some understanding of English.
Question
You be the judge, who is more efficient at solving the problems of a country based on the educational backgrounds?
What do you think?
Sources
Altiusdirectory Website: Education of Nicolas Sarkozy
Answers Website: The Education of Barack Obama
Cosmopolis Website: The Family and Education of David Cameron
Russiapedia Website: Prominent Russian: Dmitry Medvedev
Wikipedia Encyclopedia: Biographies of Barack Obama, Dmitry Medvedev, David Cameron, Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkozy, and Ali Khamenei
