7 April 2022  Issue No: 354

African universities have been urged to “commit, develop, popularise, and be intentional about institutional inclusive gender policies such as affirmative action, adaptable work environments accommodating childcare, and sexual harassment policies”, according to a new report.

Universities in the Global South need to be more creative in making up shortfalls in the financing of higher education as funding per student decreases as enrolments are increasing, a webinar held to launch a new report, World Higher Education: Institutions, students and funding, was told by the vice-chancellor of a leading African university.

The Aga Khan University in Kenya has joined the fight against global warming with an initiative expected to make it the first institution of higher learning in East Africa to go carbon neutral by 2030. Its plans affect all its operations, from procurement policies to budgeting.

A new model for transnational partnerships that acknowledges and strengthens the contribution made by public higher education institutions in the Global South is needed to produce the kind of knowledge the world needs, according to higher education leader Adam Habib.

Against the current global challenges of extremism, political populism, migration and displacement, the negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and war, Story Circles can be a powerful tool for building intercultural competence in higher education contexts and can bring people together to build understanding.

Egypt’s poor reputation when it comes to research misconduct has been dealt another blow. The country is now also at the top of the list of countries in the North African region with the most retracted journal articles, followed by Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Sudan.

Student services in many universities globally now include college mobile apps that enhance the student experience, but not all Zimbabwean universities are using them, according to Dr Vusumuzi Maphosa, the information and communications technology director and app developer at Lupane State University in Zimbabwe. Many universities still rely on websites.

University leaders and academics, ranging from professors to junior lecturers, will be vying for positions, including those of governors, members of parliament and members of the county assembly, when Kenyans go to the polls later this year. What factors are attracting them to political careers?

Professor Mahmood Mamdani was the executive director of the Makerere Institute of Social Research at Makerere University, Uganda, from 2010 to the end of Feburary 2022. He shares his views about how to build a strong research culture, his work as an academic and threats to higher education.

Will there be a post-Putin world in which Russian universities get to re-join the global community and help create a more liberal, democratic future? Or will Russia and its universities be cast further into an isolated world of neo-Stalinist repression and decline?

A compliance culture focused on criteria delineated by an external authority can result in a process of ‘ticking boxes’ rather than one of examining the achievement of strategic goals defined by the higher education institution, addressing areas for improvement and fostering continuous quality enhancement.

Joybrato Mukherjee, president of the German Academic Exchange Service, has visited Poland to discuss how Germany’s eastern neighbour is supporting refugees from Ukraine. At least 100,000 Ukrainian students and academics are expected to come to German universities in the near future.