10 March 2022  Issue No: 350

Academics have condemned an alleged instruction by an official from South Africa’s Department of Science and Innovation to muzzle scientists over the Russian invasion of Ukraine, saying that academic freedom is a constitutional right that applies to all in South Africa.

Several e-platforms have been set up to assist African students who have managed to flee from Ukraine to consider their educational options. One of the platform aims to enable them to follow the same course they were enrolled in in Ukraine at French universities.

African universities must experiment with radically different models of access and funding if they are to create new identities for themselves as decolonised institutions. Otherwise they will remain “Westoxified”, according to former student activist and now lecturer at South Africa’s University of the Witwatersrand, Rekgotsofetse Chikane.

The process of institutional reform, with its complex dynamics and dimensions, demands and disappointments, as well as opportunities and gratifications, taught me a lot about how notoriously difficult but critical it is to implement progressive, effective and sustainable change in universities. But change is hard.

Societies expect men to achieve, but women need support to overcome systemic barriers, says the first female vice-chancellor at the University of Ghana. Linguist Nana Aba Appiah Amfo took up the lead role in late 2021. She says that, when women and men support each other, they can reach their highest potential.

South African Mandisa Sthabile Malindisa travelled for four days, slept on icy roads and muscled her way through desperate crowds on several station platforms to get onto trains before she reached Budapest airport in Hungary to board a plane to Johannesburg. Now she is worrying about those who are still trapped in Ukraine.

For the past two years, students in South African tertiary education institutions have had to negotiate the choppy waters of emergency online tuition. In 2022 they have been returning to face-to-face learning. But it has required and will continue to require a process of reconnection and will have to be guided sensitively.

Indian and African students studying in Ukraine have appealed for help to get them out of the country and home to safety. Thousands are now living in fear, cut off from family and home, with no safe options for leaving the country.

Science must play its part in the political response to the Ukraine invasion. Russia must be isolated and Ukrainian colleagues offered help, but we also need to strengthen the Russian scientists and students who are critical of the government.

Based on unprecedented insight from a new global report produced by Higher Education Strategy Associates or HESA, University World News, in partnership with HESA, is hosting a free webinar on global trends in higher education enrolment and public financing of higher education on 31 March.

Higher education obviously has a responsibility to educate ‘more concerned citizens’ who participate in the broader life of our society. But ‘what’ should universities teach, and ‘how’ should they do it in order to produce such citizens? Here are some suggestions.

In response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Commission has announced a suspension of cooperation with Russian entities in research, including payments under existing contracts, as have several EU governments, but some European university organisations and experts favour a more nuanced approach.