This archive report was first published on 5 August 2019.
As an associate professor at the University of Nairobi's School of Business, I recently participated in a panel discussion on the state of universities in Kenya. The debate highlighted the need for education reforms, but it also underscored the complexity of the issue.
With Prof Karuti Kanyinga and David Aduda, I discussed the challenges facing our higher education system. The narrative surrounding these issues is that our universities are not producing employable graduates, issuing questionable degrees, and using outdated teaching methodologies. However, this narrative lacks scientific evidence, and we must be cautious not to vilify arts education in favor of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).
Despite the push for STEAM, there are suspicions that the curriculum is wanting, and we need to change tack. Even if we were to agree on a curriculum, differences of opinion exist along approach, structure, people's aspirations, and financing. The priority in reforms should focus on changing teaching approaches and introducing new curricula in a similar manner as it is happening with lower schools.
On people's aspirations, we must take into consideration promises of the past with respect to education. The mantra has been, get a good education if you want to succeed. Virtually every young citizen's aspiration, and their parents', is to get an education to change their livelihood. The role of policy is to continue to encourage people to work towards achieving their dreams and maximise their potential.
It is easy to craft solutions like limiting further expansion of universities, but implementation will always be our Achilles heel. This is because we have always ignored our political, social, and economic environment that impacts on our decisions. One will always have to deal with these issues in addressing people's aspirations if implementation is to succeed.
On structure and financing, there is a need to prescribe benchmarked standards. There is a need to radically review the Universities Act by bringing all public universities under one employer and leveraging that to deal with the problem of tribalism that is slowly tearing down universities.
Each university should have clear Key Performance Indicators with respect to research and development, leading to new innovations that are applicable to local problems, assist students to create start-ups, and incubate them as a strategy to creating wealth for their respective institutions.
What we need at the moment is investments in research and development, less bureaucracy, and good managers to help universities contribute to economic development. It was envisaged that Kenya would invest at least one percentage of Gross Domestic Product in research and development, but that has never been achieved.
The problems with public universities are many that we need to investigate properly and build the case for reforms. We also need an inclusive process that will lead to sustainable solutions. It is not the policy maker's role to determine the optimal number of universities in the country. Let that be the role of market dynamics and an effective regulatory regime.
