KENYA: Academics attack finance plans

The University Academic Staff Union has lashed out at a proposal to merge 'regular' and 'parallel' degree programmes offered at Kenya's public universities, and accused the World Bank of "sabotage".

Unifying currently separate courses for state-sponsored and self-sponsored students, and charging students uniform fees, were among sweeping changes to university financing recommended in an expert report published last month.

The academic union's Secretary General, Professor Muga K' Olale, claimed those advocating the merger did not have the country's interests at heart.

Speaking in Kakamega in Western Kenya during a meeting of the union's chapter at Masinde Muliro University of Science and Technology, K' Olale said: "This is a plan by the World Bank to sabotage Kenya's realisation of its Vision 2030 [the national economic development plan]. The merging of the programmes if implemented will deny local universities revenue."

The reaction came after publication of a report compiled by a team of international and local experts, titled Financing University Education in Kenya. It proposed that public universities turn to parents, students, donors and entrepreneurship to earn income rather than relying on increased government funding.

Aside from recommending that government-sponsored (regular) and self-sponsored (parallel) courses be unified and their students be charged the same tuition fees, the report suggested that fees be pegged to the instructional costs of programmes, their market demand and the prevailing starting salaries of their graduates.

A further proposal was that fees for food and accommodation provided by universities be adjusted upwards.

The experts also proposed a revised governmental annual recurrent budget allocation to universities to add a limited but selective competitive fund for doctorate studies and research.

"The Ministry of Higher Education and the Higher Education Loans Board should fund a number of scholarships based on merit and financial need," the report added.

Kenya introduced 'parallel' programmes as a way of increasing student numbers without the government having to provide the money to fund the expansion, which it could not afford.

Students who would not otherwise have accessed university have been able to enter fee-charging 'parallel' programmes that have been run separately from regular courses.

Academics teaching parallel courses may be paid extra for this work - lecturers who have been benefiting could lose additional income source if the proposals are implemented - while universities have also earned income from high-fee courses.

Although 'parallel' courses have achieved the goal of widening access to higher education, there have also been problems. One, according to media reports, has been tensions among state-sponsored and self-sponsored students. Also, high-achieving students from privileged backgrounds have benefited from state subsidies, sometimes at the cost of poor students.

Currently students in regular, state-subsidised programmes pay as little as 26,000 Kenyan shillings (US$338) per academic year while students on parallel programmes pay around 150,000 shillings a year. At one local university, regular students pay fees of 8,000 against 60,000 shillings for parallel - also known as 'module II' - students.

If the Ministry of Higher Education, Science and Technology implements the experts' proposals, then regular students would suffer while parallel students would be relieved.

The Kenya University National Students Union, the umbrella organisation for student representatives, has also contested the report. Union officials said most regular students came from very poor families, and any increase in tuition fees would deny bright but needy students a chance to further their studies.

According to the report, fee increases should be imposed as soon as next year but the implementation of all the proposals should be staggered over two to three years.