 How
under-funding has reduced Universities in Africa to academic orphans
by Serah Naisoi
Universities in sub-Saharan Africa have become academic orphans
and their role in research and development diminishes by the day.
After several decades of under-funding, brain drain, student
unrest and lecturers=
strikes, universities in Africa are just a little more than glorified high
schools.
Today, financial uncertainty, poorly trained lecturers and
ill-prepared students have contributed to the loss of a scientific research
agenda in most African universities.
To make matters worse, there are many graduates in humanities who
cannot find employment in sub-Saharan Africa yet there is an unmet demand for
Science graduates.
The lack of a scientific research agenda and petty ethnic
politics has made universities hostage to student selection quota systems. Too
often, faculty appointments, promotions and even curriculum design are made on
political grounds rather than on merit.
Over time, universities in Africa have been reduced to mere
theatres of mediocrity instead of being credible centres for research and
scholarship. African universities are the opposite of Asia=s
emerging academic tigers, the most successful being in South Korea.
Today, Asia=s
academic tigers have increased their post graduate admissions to almost 40 per
cent of university student population, yet in most African universities, it is
less than 5 per cent.
Besides, government in Africa send thousands of post graduate
students and researchers to study in American, British, German and French
universities and to work on short-term industrial projects.
What amazes me is that, while African universities are bogged
down by who to promote, South East Asia universities have adopted promotion
criteria and fool proof recruitment.
Those seeking employment in the universities must have terminal
degrees from leading universities anywhere in the world. To avoid corruption in
promotion, leading South Korean universities use the science citation index, a
data base of articles in 3,700 of the top science journals in the world.
It has been pointed out that most universities in Africa train
students in the same way they did at independence. For example, the general
Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree was meant to bridge a yawning gap of trained
personnel at independence. But 40 years later, after independence, it still
appears in most universities admission brochures.
Today (BA) is so unpopular in most universities in Africa to an
extent that students ridicule it as a Bachelor of
Anything on earth!
Universities in Africa have been accused of producing a teacher,
engineer, veterinarian and economist in the 21st century just as they
did 40 years ago.
Another accusation has been that the universities in Africa place
students in any course if they fail to meet the requirements of their favourite
faculties.
The students who picked medicine or law as their first choices
but failed to meet the points required, are thrown to any other course.
However, in the 1990s, public universities in Africa allowed
students to revise their choices. This ameliorated the problem but did not solve
it.
Today, commitment to university research and development is
lacking in sub-Saharan Africa. In most countries, universities are chronically
underfunded.ALaboratories
are almost bare, faculty poorly qualified and students badly taught to an extent
that some end up spending up to five to six years for a course that takes only
three years to complete in universities in the west.
Governments and universities should adopt ideas from the South
Korean experience; using scientific knowledge to address problems in public
health, agriculture, environmental degradation and industrial development.
But this can only happen if universities in Africa are
transformed into engines of industrial take-off and students stopped from
studying courses that lead to
Aeducated
unemployment@.
With such initiatives, the young tigers of Asia are entering the
academic stage with an impact reminiscent of their countries entry to the
industrial centre-stage in the 1970s.
Serah Naisoi is a teacher in one of the private schools in
Arusha, Tanzania
Email: naisoiv@yahoo.co.uk
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