28 September 2023  Issue No: 422

Students in Burkina Faso and Niger blocked from studying in France through that country’s withdrawal of visa facilities are being urged to consider alternative higher education options for 2024. As diplomatic relations continue to deteriorate, time is running out for prospective international students.

The number of universities in Africa participating in the 20th and largest-ever edition of the Times Higher Education World University Rankings has increased by 16%, from 97 in 2022 to 113 this year. The best-ranked university on the continent sits in 167th place.

Libya has launched a 10-year national higher education and scientific research strategy spanning 2024 to 2034 that aims to reform education, teaching and scientific research within universities and research centres, and promote their role in achieving sustainable development via the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

Universities are vital institutions with great promise and contribute in myriad ways to society. But there are good reasons to critique universities in Africa, both those created by colonial overlords and those that emerged in the post-independence years, writes Professor Saleem Badat.

Funding organisations in Germany are unlikely to cut financial support for higher education programmes in Africa despite political upheavals and conflicts happening around the world, said Kai Sicks, the secretary general of the German Academic Exchange Service or DAAD, at an event celebrating 50 years of the DAAD in Africa.

When Professor Tahir Mamman, Nigeria’s minister of education, was sworn in alongside 44 other ministers by President Bola Tinubu recently, he swiftly sprang into action, stating how ready he was to address the enormous tasks before him. The expectations are huge for the 69-year-old minister.

The extraordinary work that universities have done over decades to advance sustainable development is not sufficiently recognised by society at large, governments or the United Nations system. A new partnership between University World News and the International Association of Universities will address that problem.

France has suspended student mobility with Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso and told new students from those countries who were about to start studies in France that they may not come after all. Current scholarship students without valid visas will also not be able to travel to France.

Concerns over Russia’s authoritarian turn and its actions in Ukraine may result in the further disintegration of the Soviet model, with internationalisation of higher education both a driving force and a force for stability in the emerging regional order.

With students looking for ways to fund their way through university and with employers keen for graduates with entrepreneurial skills, universities around the world would be wise to increase their support for entrepreneurship education and help to normalise it as a career path.

An international panel discussion on the topic of ‘responsible internationalisation’ is Sweden’s latest contribution to an ongoing debate over how far national security considerations can be taken before academic freedoms and institutional autonomy come under threat – and what ‘responsible’ really means.