3 November 2022  Issue No: 381

Persistent complaints over low state funding levels of higher education in Africa could become a thing of the past if universities became more proactive in responding to the socio-economic needs of society. If universities meet the people’s needs, funding will follow, a webinar of the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture heard.

Egypt has 26 ranked universities, South Africa 15 and Algeria 13 on the subject rankings list of Times Higher Education, which measured the performance of institutions in 11 key subject areas. A total of 96 universities in 17 countries in Africa are included on the list.

The African academic community has an essential role to play in promoting democracy on the continent, particularly through research on what ordinary citizens think about the subject and on the broader question of good governance, researchers heard after a virtual public dialogue organised by the Alliance for African Partnership.

“The US$100 billion pledge for climate finance made during COP26 at Glasgow appears to be a pipedream. Needless to say, closing finance gaps and increasing the flow of climate finance ... from both the public and private sector are critical,” says Joyce Kimutai, principal meteorologist at the Kenya Meteorological Department.

A visual redress praxis has emerged during the past decade as a transformation priority on the campuses of Stellenbosch University, South Africa. The university has prioritised changes in its visual culture, the renaming of buildings and architectural representations of various university spaces. This is a reflection on the politics of visual redress.

In October 2022 the ministry of education introduced a new strategy for the administration of the Ethiopian School-Leaving Certificate Examination. The higher education system was instrumental in the delivery of the exam and the process enabled academics to observe first-hand the challenge of poor-quality education.

Some tertiary education institutions take a short-term approach to attracting private funds, while a more effective method is known as advancement. This is a holistic, longer-term process whereby an institution positions itself strategically and engages judiciously with its external environment to ensure sustainability.

Student entrepreneurs, or agripreneurs, from various higher education institutions are initiating innovative, life-changing projects to ensure food security, modernising farming methods with the help of technology, sharing their ideas and knowledge with existing farmers – and are hoping to inspire young people to work in the agricultural sector.

Strengthening the transformative power of universities calls for us to go beyond the limitations of the ‘modernisation’ agenda which has been accompanied by a misplaced discourse focused on employability, excellence, efficiency and entrepreneurship, according to a speaker at the recent conference of the International Association of Universities.

The findings of an inquiry at South Africa’s Stellenbosch University by Justice Sisi Khampepe into institutional racism are expected to be released soon. It followed an incident during which a white male student urinated on the belongings of a black student. Two similar incidents have since taken place. In this article, staff responses are considered alongside the implications and opportunities of the probe.

The results of the new QS World University Rankings: Sustainability 2023 show a bias towards Western universities and it is hard to avoid suspicions that products like this are compensating for the failure of Western universities to meet the scientific challenge from China.

The Saudi government’s recent unveiling of new educational visas for international students aims to send a message that the Kingdom is a welcoming and emerging environment for research and study and restates the government’s commitment to the country’s Vision 2030 educational ambitions.

Newly launched global rankings, which measure universities’ contributions towards sustainability, were motivated in part by research that found that a majority of students held the view that universities could and should be doing more to address the world’s most pressing environmental and social challenges.