Today, we live in the global village. The ratio of the distance on the map with the time it takes is no longer the same as the past. Past formulas are not fitted to today’s conditions. Crossing the boarders does not mean tolerating pain and misery. We can reach the place we wanted in a blink of the eye. Similarly, if a person wants to learn science and has the necessary requirements, can cross the difficult boarders that are manipulated by politics without a problem and reach the highest peaks with fast airplanes. People can now tolerate getting home sick since they have the food they could eat in their hometown in any place and talk with their parents and loved ones from the distance and listen to new Iranian music and download newly published Farsi books. In addition, an individual in the library of his university in California can visit the holy shrine of Imam Reza online. In other words, there is no distance between an immigrant and his family and beliefs, except for the physical distance. At the same time, the immigrants can benefit from the best professors in the best universities of the world and work in multinational companies and return to their hometown one day. However, some of these people may never come back.

Their return would really make us happy and even if they do not come back, my many years of experience, especially in the past few years, in the national elites foundation, which led to more familiarization with potential youth, says that they remain the cultural ambassadors of their homeland and their honor will be our honor. Everywhere they go, they introduce themselves as Iranians and are proud to be an Iranian. In addition, they will any opportunity to serve their country.

However, the passed time has provide us with many valuable lessons and experiences. Review of the history of our country reminds us that the background of immigration of science learners of our country to other nations to learn their knowledge dates back to before Islam. Our ancestors have said that Anushiravan sent a number of students and professors of the Academy of Gondishapur to India to learn their acquired sciences. It is also written in the literature that Borzuya (Persian physician) was among these individuals, who was returned to Iran with a number of scholars and Indian books. However, the emergence of Islam in Iran turned a new leaf in the history of science and knowledge of Iran. The fact that our prophet stated: “Seek knowledge even as far as China” and Imam Ali expressed: “learn wisdom even if it comes from the enemy” taught the Iranians who are eager to learn that the study of science is an absolute necessity in the belief system of this religion and there is no restrictions, such as time and location.

As a result, immigration for education of students and seekers of knowledge is praised today. While this method was forgotten during the period of decline of Islamic civilization in our country, its first reviver was Abbas Mirza, an Iranian brave commander, who realized that being distanced from the science and techniques of the modern world is the main cause of lack of advancements in Iran and constant failures. Therefore, he sent the first group of Iranian students abroad to study science.

Similarly, Amir Kabir, who had experienced the same thing, established the Darolfonoon school, which led to the continuity of the tradition of sending students abroad to teach professors and enter new sciences to the country, even after his death. There have always been scientific centers and cities in the world, which attracted the demanders of specific sciences. The same has been observed in Islamic sciences since the demanders of knowledge travel to Najaf, Qom and Khorasan to learn about this area.

Up to this point, all that I have said are related to the past; the time when the aspirants of knowledge had to undergo significant difficulties and tolerate the long distance and hard roads and their relatives would have no news about them or wait a long time to receive a letter from them. These people would also pass the time with severe difficulty in order to receive the money their families had sent a few months ago. I mean to say that learning new sciences was so important in the past that people were eager to tolerate the problems of immigration and being away from the family and even the risks of financial difficulties, none of which prevented them from learning science.

Over the past few years, there have been many students admitted by the best universities of the United States and Europe due to their competencies, many of whom have returned to Iran after flourishing and gaining valuable experiences and established startups of knowledge-based companies, which has significantly contributed to the non-oil economy of the country. Right at this moment that I am writing this note, I remember the name of many large companies that are recognized by all the audiences and even use their services. However, I cannot say their names in order to prevent advertising for them.

Meanwhile, there are some people, who use a media to announce inaccurate and wrong statistics on the immigration of the youth, stating with a political attitude that our talented youth and elites are hunted by the superpowers of the world and enemies of Iran. I saw somewhere that a person quoted statistics from the International Monetary Fund that in 2009, Iran was ranked first among 92 evaluated countries in terms of drain of highly educated individuals. Nevertheless, this report is absolutely wrong. International monetary fund has published no such report in 2009 and this journalistic charlatanism has tried to show a high level of immigrated individuals with political goals by providing these bizarre and wrong statistics. If you doubt it, you can search the internet to find this report and you will see that it is not true.

I invite those eager to learn about the actual statistics on immigration of the youth to read the rest of the note. In the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1978, the total number of Iranian students was 270 thousand individuals, 100 thousand of whom were studying in foreign universities. From this number of people, 57 thousand were studying in the Unites States, meaning that Iran formed the largest colony of non-American students (mainly by scholarship). However, in 2017, the population of Iranian students is 7.4 million people, from whom only 48 thousand cases equal to one percent of the total Iranian students are living abroad. From the mentioned number of students, only 12 thousand individuals are studying in the universities of the United States (no scholarship). These numbers show that not only the number of potential students for studying abroad has not increased, but also has significantly decreased. The number of Arabic students in America is five times more than Iranian students. In this regard, Iran is ranked 13 after China, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Turkey and other countries.

However, more important than these numbers is a blissful event, which occurred some years ago and is known as reverse immigration. Statistics have shown that 800 of the best Iranian talents, which are graduated from top universities of the world, have returned to the country with the planning and support of the national elites foundation and are now active in their own specific field and serve Iran. This can be regarded as the realization of the order of the Supreme Leader of Iran, who stated in a meeting with the students and top science talents of the country in October 2015: “you have to that being an elite is a blessing formed by the Islamic revolution since the our youth recognized their identity and bravery through the revolution to show their talent.” In this regard, our youth showed the whole world that such advancements can be achieved by Iranians.  

Considering all of these, do you think that the educational immigration of students and talents is indicative of bad condition of Iran? Do we really need to be extremely devastated when one of the top students of the country immigrates to another nation? Is this a threat to our social identity? Our ancestors have taught us that if we teach our children that serving the homeland is an eternal honor, they would never act in a way that would damage their country. Iranians are among the people with highest level of being homesick. I do not know any other nation line Iran that has taken every moment of his life in Iran with himself as a valuable treasure. Statistics have also shown that those who have left the country have returned and announced their concerns with providing services to the country. If we try to regard the immigration of students and elites something unfavorable, we consciously or unconsciously put a burden on their shoulders, which makes their return harder and slower. This could lead to accusing them as those turning their back to their homeland. However, this is not the case and according to the recommendations of the religious figures, we should not prevent the people from learning the farthest locations. Therefore, it is necessary to see the issue from another perspective and consider what is for the benefit of the country. The tree of scientific acceleration and knowledge-based economy will provide us with sweeter fruits by the efforts of all Iranians, including the migrants.

Parviz Karami

President of the information and communication center of the Vice-Presidency for science and technology affairs