Government budget cuts force change in universities’ model

Government cuts to budgets have meant that, instead of focusing on key roles of teaching and research, African universities have followed a neoliberal model based largely on income-generation, according to Professor David Some, former chief executive officer of Kenya’s Commission for University Education.

In a recent speech entitled “Kenya’s Higher Education in the Last 50 Years: Trends, challenges and forecasts on higher education in Africa” – in part a call for responsible management and good governance at higher education institutions – Some said while fee increases were meant to cater for the budget deficit at universities, institutions had found other ways of making money.

“The biggest revolution has been the application of a neoliberal model to higher learning institutions which is based largely on income-generation,” he told his audience at the United States International University-Africa on 31 October.

Some noted that in Kenya the 2018 finance bill shed a total of KES2.37 billion (US$23 million) earmarked for university and vocational education, and KES1.07 billion from proposed budgets that were implemented in the 2018-19 financial year. Educators raised concerns about these cuts, saying public universities were already struggling to stay afloat.

Burden shifts to parents and students

Some said the decrease in government funding had pushed the financial burden onto parents and students. This move not only increased student debt but prevented students from poorer backgrounds accessing higher education.

These challenges will have a long-term impact on the quality of education as well as graduates. Furthermore, it will lead to lower research productivity, Some warned. “If standards slip, academics become out of touch, students grow complacent and management becomes brutal.”

The professor said academic freedom should be “reconciled with the demand for higher education institutions to be financially viable, climb league tables, construct programmes useful to employers and produce useful research”.

He said following cases of risky financial investments, unreasonable expansion decisions, and lowering academic standards to reduce costs, the question of whether higher education institutions were forgetting their societal mission was coming to the fore.

Some said government and civil society should apply pressure on higher education institutions to become trustworthy, accountable and transparent and to deliver quality education.

He said universities and colleges need to build their profiles on their ability to provide quality education.

“Students are increasingly guided by the performance of institutions in the area they choose to study,” said Some. But universities are expected to do more and perform better with the same or fewer resources.

He said institutions should be “responsive and proactive”. Institutions should embody “earned trust” and, instead of mere accountability, should aim for “development and improvement”.

Some noted that globalisation and new communication technologies had led to critical reflections on research dissemination and the nature of research, with greater demands for open access publication, transparency of ethics in research, the use of larger data sets and innovative ways to collaborate internationally. Therefore, a deep understanding of the responsibility of research, researchers and their institutions was vital to understanding higher education, he said.

Corporate citizens

“Universities represent a vital part of any society and this calls for them to be good corporate citizens,” he said.

For Some, the best way to achieve macro-efficiency was by adapting the concept of social responsibility, which should be guided by the pursuit of excellence in teaching, training, research and institutional performance; prioritising the needs of society; and finding a balance between short-term relevance and service and long-term quality of basic and applied research, professional training and general education.

He said higher education institutions should also pursue internationalisation strategies that focus on global issues in an increasingly connected world.

Citing Brexit and refugee crises, Some said institutions should prepare better for a changing world. They should be asking if and how higher education institutions can foster international partnerships that make meaningful contributions to a global society.

Continuing professional development, said Some, was also crucial in higher education, helping academics and lecturers stay “interested and interesting”, which ultimately led to an improved student experience.