Policy and Legislative Challenges in South African Higher Education: Implications for Institutional Governance
Paper 27
Part 1 Abstract
The main challenges facing the South African higher education system can be categorized in three main groups, namely; historical challenges, challenges of change and challenges of efficiency and effectiveness. These can be sub-categorised to include issues of access, transformation, funding, multilingualism, throughput and governance, to mention but a few. A policy and legislative framework put in place to address most of these challenges has recently undergone changes that have brought about several challenges with serious implications to the governance of higher education institutions. The purpose of this paper is, firstly, to outline the main challenges facing the South African higher education system; and secondly, to highlight recent policy and regulatory changes with specific focus on the amendments to the Higher Education Act (101 of 1997). Thirdly, the paper will look at the implications of the challenges brought about by the said changes with a view to exploring some lessons for higher education in other parts of the world.
Policy and Legislative Challenges in South African Higher Education: Implications for Institutional Governance
Part 2 Outline
Some challenges facing South African higher education
The key challenges facing the South African higher education system remain as broadly summarized inthe 1997 Education White Paper 3: A Programme for the Transformation of Higher Education in the following terms:
“In South Africa today, the challenge is to redress past inequalities and to transform the higher education system to serve a new social order, to meet pressing national needs, and to respond to new realities and opportunities.”
To date, this challenge still forms the bedrock of most of the other challenges of higher education in South Africa as the higher education system, and many other facets of the South African society still struggle to overcomethe social, economic and structural inequalities of the past.A closely related challenge is that of overcoming the legacies of the past in terms of mindsets and differentiation based on colour and race.As a result, an important challenge is that of fixing a dysfunctional secondary school system that is still grappling with the above mentioned legacies.Today, most of the students joining the higher education system are inadequately prepared and are unable to cope and succeed during their first years at university. This adds to the perennial problem of low retention and the added challenge of high drop-out rates.
Higher education in South Africa has undergone massive transformation during the past eighteen years or so. The policy and legislative framework governing this transformation includes, inter alia, A Framework for Transformation of Higher Education developed in 1996, the Education White Paper 3: A Programme for the Transformation of Higher Education (1997), the National Plan for Higher Education (2001)and the Higher Education Act (101 of 1997).What this framework introduced includes changes in terms of size, shape and reconfiguration of higher education institutions, changesto the organizational structures of higher education institutions, accompanied by changes in management and governance. These changes did not come about without their own challenges. One important change that has posed several challenges relates to the public funding of higher education. The nature and sources of funding for the higher-education system have become increasingly relevant and topical. This is because higher education receives less than half of its funding directly from the state and institutions are under increasing pressure from government to contain soaring tuition fees.
The other challenge is that of equity and transformation – the race, gender and social class distribution of students in various fields and levels of study and the racial and gender representivity of staff. There have been significant strides in many South African universities to enroll African students, female students and students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Consequently, there have been significant changes in the demographic character of student distribution in higher education institutions. The same cannot be said about the equity profile of staff.
An important challenge relates to poor throughput rates. This is perhaps the biggest challenge as it has a significant impact on the absolute number of graduates available to address the shortage of high-level skills on the labour market. In 2008, Higher Education South Africa (HESA) reported that 35% of first-years dropped out after their first year (Sapa 2008). A year earlier, research showed that only 15% of students who enrolled, completed their degrees in the designated time; 30% dropped out after the first year and a further 20% dropped out after their second or third year (Breier and Mabizela, 2007: 281).
Then there is the challengeof language and multilingualism. The main language of teaching is a second or foreign language for many South African higher education students. This is usually English at most South African universities or Afrikaansat a few. This means that students from disadvantaged educational backgrounds have to learn in their second or third language. Research has shown that language and academic success are closely related. Students learning in their second or third language are therefore at a disadvantage which is compounded by poor schooling background (Jaffer, Ng’ambiCzerniewicz, 2007: 134).
One of the main challenges facing South African higher education is poor governance and management of higher education institutions. According to Higher Education South Africa (HESA), this specifically relates to “issues of power and responsibilities as dealt with by Councils, the university leadership, senior administrators, academics, staff, students, policy makers and other external stakeholders” (HESA: 2010). In many universities, the roles and responsibilities of Councils and the way they have been executed has been quite problematic. Partisan and personal interests of some Council members have led to several higher education institutions being crippled by weak governance and poor leadership.
Policy and legislative changes
Since 2009, the Ministry of Higher Education and Training has introduced a number of policy changes with implications for institutional governance. The most significant (and perhaps most contentious) of these include the Green Paper on Post-School Education and Training which sets a vision for a single, coherent, differentiated and articulated post-school education and training system; the Draft Regulations for Reporting by Public Higher Education Institutions; theMinisterial Oversight Committee on Transformation in the South African Public Universities and the Ministerial Committee for the review of the funding of universities.
Arguably, the most contentious legislative changes relate to the amendment of various sections of the Higher Education Act (101 of 1997) through the promulgation of the Higher Education and Training Laws Amendment Act (23 of 2012). The amendment provides for, inter alia, the appointment of an administrator for a higher education institution; the closure of a higher education institution andthe extension of the powers and functions of an independent assessor. It gives the minister the power to intervene in the case of poor or non-performance or maladministration by a public higher education institution and provides for the dissolution of a university council as well as the procedure for such dissolution. It also provides for the extension of the powers of an administrator to temporarily take over the management, governance and administration of council of a public higher education institution.
Implications for institutional governance
Regarding policy changes, there were many concerns expressed about the radical changes introduced by the Green Paper on Post-School Education and Training. It will be interesting to see how those concerns are taken into account when the White Paper comes out in the near future. The same applies to the Draft Regulations for Reporting by Public Higher Education Institutions which have been seen as extremely onerous and unworkable. If the public reaction to the establishment of the Ministerial Oversight Committee on Transformation is anything to go by, the committee has its work cut out. The main implication here relates to how the committee will interact with the leadership of higher education institutions, some of whom are sceptical about its establishment. And as for the Committee for the review of the funding of universities, an assessment of the implications can only be made after the report and a new funding formula are released, hopefully in the near future.
The main implications of the amendments to the Higher Education Act relate, inter alia, to the following:
More powers are given to an independent assessor;
The Minister is allowed to ‘intervene’ in running the affairs of the university, thereby undermining the role of councils;
Administrators are expected to perform the roles of management, governance and administration; and
Councils are dissolved automatically on the appointment of an administrator by the Minister.
These could lead to a possible rise in the number of independent assessors appointed to deal with a range of issues in higher education institutions, a possible rise in the number of ‘interventions’ by the Minister and a possible rise in the number of directives issued by the Minister to councils of public HEIs. The roles, powers and authority of university councils could be grossly reduced in the name of strengthening public accountability, with universities effectively being run by the Minister through administrators appointed by him/her.
The amendments, it may be argued therefore, are inconsistent with the spirit of cooperative governance which was meant to underpin the relationship between the State and the Higher Education sector as captured in the Education White Paper 3 as follows:
It is the responsibility of higher education institutions to manage their own affairs. The Ministry has no responsibility or wish to micro-manage institutions. Nor is it desirable for the Ministry to be too prescriptive in the regulatory frameworks it establishes…It is only in extreme circumstances that the Minister of [Higher] Education, as the responsible representative of the elected government of the country, would consider intervening in order to assist to restore good order and legitimate governance and management in an institution.
Conclusion
The South African higher education sector faces many challenges. These challenges have been compounded by policy and legislative changes which are perceived to violate the principles of institutional autonomy and cooperative governance. The main lesson to learn from all this is that there is a delicate balance between institutional autonomy and accountability in higher education – a public good funded by public money. According to the spokesperson of the Minister of Higher Education and Training, “…institutional autonomy can never be an end in itself if you are a public institution that is subject to the national imperatives of a developmental state like ours and sustained through public funds” (Nkosi: Mail and Guardian: 9 November 2012). Many entrusted with the governance of higher education institutions in South Africa would obviously disagree.
References
Breier, M. & Mabizela, M., Higher Education, inKraak, A. & Press, K. (eds). Human Resources Development Review 2008: Education, Employment and Skills in South Africa (2008)
CHE, Education White Paper 3: A Programme for the Transformation of Higher Education at
HESA, Transformation Challenges in Governance, Leadership and Management in Higher Education (2010)
Jaffer, S., Ng’ambi, D. & Czerniewicz, L. The role of ICTs in higher education in South Africa: One strategy for addressing teaching and learning challenges, International Journal of Education and Development using Information and Communication Technology (2007) 3(4) 131-142.
Nkosi, B. Universities Round on Nzimande and his Higher Education Amendment Bill, Mail and Guardian, 9 November 2012 at