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Latest education
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id21
is the free development research reporting service, bringing you UK-resourced
research on developing countries.
September 2008,
id21 insights education, Issue #7
Building sustainable
higher education
With the growing
knowledge economy, higher education is no longer seen as a luxury that
developing countries cannot afford, but a critical element of national
development. Countries must become globally competitive through skills
training, given that good quality products and services are crucial
in the fight for global profits.
Higher education
is therefore expected to promote economically-productive knowledge:
advanced skills will attract investment leading to economic growth which
will benefit all sectors of society.
However, the obstacles
in many developing countries are alarming. Historical conditions such
as colonial and post-colonial origins of the university system, structural
adjustment policies and 'brain drain' have all had negative impacts.
There is also a growing demand for university places, a lack of basic
resources such as classrooms, scientific equipment and libraries and
too few skilled and committed academic staff. According to the World
Bank's 2000 report on higher education, many universities, particularly
in Africa, have reached crisis point.
Students
during an economics lecture delivered in English at Suffolk University's
satellite campus in Dakar, Senegal. This is a private American college,
which opened in 1999, aiming to attract middle and upper class students
from across Africa. Degrees cost around half as much as they would in
the USA. ©Jacob Silberberg/Panos Pictures 2004. See Editorial
Other articles
in this issue:
The
growth of private providers in Brazil
There is a
cruel irony in Brazilian higher education. The high fees for private
universities put them beyond the reach of most people. At the same time,
intense competition for places at the free public universities means
that on the whole, only those who have attended expensive preparatory
courses are admitted. People living in poverty are thereby excluded
on both counts.
Chinese
universities seek global competitiveness
Modernisation, reform and opening up to the outside world have transformed
China's economy from highly-centralised and planned into dynamic and
market-oriented. The higher education sector has to adopt resulting
challenges and new approaches, including privatisation and decentralisation.
How are Chinese universities addressing global changes to become more
competitive and successful?
The
World Bank and the knowledge revolution
Since 2000, the World Bank has seen higher education as vital to development.
This is a change of focus from its advocacy throughout the 1990s, primarily
based around basic education linked to the Education for All goals.
In that time, research documented higher benefits to developing economies
from primary education. Within the Bank, there is now acceptance that
the neglect of higher education was misplaced.
Achieving
equity and quality in South Africa
Building
a post-apartheid higher education system in South Africa has to overcome
old and new forms of inequity. Since 1994, enrolment rates for black
students have risen to 60.8 percent of total enrolments in non-distance
mode courses. Women students comprise 54.5 percent of all students in
the higher education system. Yet their academic success and more representative
distribution across subject areas remain a challenge.
Reversing
the brain drain from African universities
A critical challenge for higher education in Africa is 'brain drain'
– losing highly trained or qualified people through emigration.
In some countries, for example Cape Verde, the Gambia and Somalia, tertiary-educated
migrants comprise over a half of all those leaving the country. Universities
are left with vacant positions and the science subjects in particular
are suffering.
Universities
in Latin America support development
One of the main goals of the Latin American University Reform movement
of 1918 was to transform the university's relations with society and
work together for social and democratic fairness. Even today, universities
have to support development by creating new knowledge for promoting
social change. Access to higher education needs to increase significantly,
to create new knowledge and train people to use it.
Gender
equity remains a dream
Are women choosing non-traditional subjects at university level?
Do they have the same career development opportunities as men? Focusing
on access, curriculum transformation and staff development in higher
education, new research in five higher education institutes in South
Africa, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, Tanzania and Uganda finds that gender inequity
still prevails.
India's
response to GATS
The National
Knowledge Commission, the advisory body to the Prime Minister of India,
aims to transform India into a knowledge society. Advisors recommend
expanding access to higher education and improving the quality of learning
through the Five-Year Plan for 2007 to 2012. This will use funds increased
by ten times (to US$300 billion) from the previous plan to reach a target
enrolment of 21 million by 2012. One important strategy to transforming
higher education is through promoting privatisation.
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Reducing
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Academic versus
vocational education in Tanzania's manufacturing sector
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