1 September 2022  Issue No: 372

The safety of the university community who form part of the civilian population in Ethiopia’s Tigray region is in doubt following reports of airstrikes by Ethiopia’s air force on the regional capital, Mekelle, which caused deaths and injuries.

Outside the United States, scholars of race and slavery are both deepening and widening the study of slavery, breaking down binary distinctions between slavery and freedom by examining forms of dependency over time as well as the changing racisms that shape international and domestic relations.

“As a region we must promote participatory approaches in research and community engagement to allow co-generation of ideas at grassroots level and co-design solutions to the climate crisis. Universities need to transform the academic, technical information into simple language,” says Dr Olga Laiza Kupika, a Zimbabwean natural resources conservationist.

Ranking organisations themselves are not vocal in pointing out the limitations of their tools, giving public authorities and the higher education community a shared responsibility to highlight the fact that rankings give only a very partial impression of the quality of higher education.

If implemented well, open-science practices have the power to connect countries and the world in unprecedented ways, something which is to the benefit of research progress overall, a study into open access in Angola states. But the Southern African country’s higher education institutions still have much to do on this front.

Florence Jedidiah Mulenga has addressed a United Nations Commission conference about supporting girls in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics space, has won numerous awards and has developed a concept to tackle asthma and hypertension. Next, the fifth-year pharmacy student wants to focus on taking innovations from Africa to a global market.

The Nigerian government’s handling of the ongoing Academic Staff Union of Universities strike remains under fire. Its inaction is hurting parents, lecturers, students, businesses, and its own developmental agenda. Experts estimate that, situated as it is within communities that rely on university economies, the strike is contributing to joblessness.

Mounting pressure for the decolonisation of higher education presents progressive opportunities for epistemic freedom and the emergence of universities that are authentic African universities, according to Sabelo Ndlovu-Gatsheni, the chair in epistemologies of the Global South at the University of Bayreuth, Germany.

Virtual learning is no longer just a short-term bridge to sustain a commitment to global education during a pandemic. Having entered the mainstream, it now offers a real opportunity to ensure the achievement of inclusive and equitable quality education at a global level.

At a time when the international student market is characterised by ongoing turbulence, and competition in the sector is immense, universities that address the overall well-being of international students, be it economic, emotional, psychological or social, are likely to stand out.

United States President Joe Biden’s long-awaited plan to deal with the student debt crisis – a critical issue with total debt at US$1.6 trillion and 16% of the more than 43 million borrowers in default – offers loan-forgiveness to millions, including middle-class borrowers, and a cap on the rate of pay.