EDITORIAL: Audit varsity courses for quality and staffing

Opinion and Analysis

Graduands at a past graduation ceremony. Universities have a role to develop students to become thinkers who can write, speak clearly and are confident. FILE 

By BUSINESS DAILY

The stoppage of certain courses, including engineering and law, from being taught in some universities has put the higher education sector under the spotlight.

It has revealed the need to audit the courses currently being offered by universities on the basis of whether they are accredited and meet the expected quality in terms of instruction, curriculum, staffing, materials and research.

There is a supervision lacuna in the way universities are rushing ahead and starting to offer courses without consulting with the relevant professional bodies or even seeking to meet their own regulations on quality instruction.

You now have some varsities offering medical degrees even without teaching hospitals. The trend is costing parents and students money, time and even their entire livelihoods.

You now have students who have completed and graduated in some courses only to be told that the same had not been accredited by the relevant authorities.

While some of the graduates were expecting to be absorbed into the job market, they have found themselves in a situation where they have to retrain, or go into menial jobs as if they had no papers yet they have spent years and money in training.

But the main blame it to be placed on the hands of the university authorities who fail to take heed of the warnings issued to them. They should be held accountable.

There are now universities scattered all over the country, but one must ask whether such institutions are even able to attract lecturers and other workers to keep them running.

The deterioration in the management of public universities has been taking place for just over a decade now, but can be traced more squarely with the onset of the parallel degree programmes where even those holding minimum qualifications found their way to the universities.

The institutions appear to be driven by their intention to make money. They introduce as many courses as possible without regard to their ability to teach them properly.

There are many cases where you have classes with hundreds of students, but they have only one lecturer who is expected to mark the tests as well as their term papers in a competent manner.

Even invigilating a class of 600 students during exams becomes an arduous task that will probably leave room for many students to cheat.

At the end of the day, one must wonder what quality of graduates will be produced in such an environment.

Private universities that have the necessary class materials, do research and insist on quality teaching are therefore occupying the enviable position of being able to produce graduates who are better prepared for the job market.