Outline of presentation

1. Old patterns and new developments: What should be the focus of higher education development over the next five years?Ian ScottUniversity of Cape Town October 2010

2. Outline of presentation • What is happening at the HE-business interface? • What does the economy need from HE? • What are we getting? • What are the obstacles to getting better? • Where are we going? • What should we – including organised business – be fighting for?

3. What is happening at the HE-business interface? • How are graduate recruiters experiencing the fit between HE output and the needs of the economy? • Skills shortages • complex matter but ... • Graduate unemployment: some anomalies? • differential employment rates by race (Bhorat et al 2010) • co-existence with skills shortages? • Preferred institutions for recruitment • and the issue of institutional differentiation • ...........

4. What does the country most need from higher education? • More good research • though universities are no longer the only source • More good graduates • quantity, quality, relevance and mix • What do we ascribe our shortcomings to? • So what are we getting? • understanding the national picture

5. Participation rates* • Overall: 16% • White: 60% • Indian: 51% • Black: 12% • Coloured: 12% * Approximate gross enrolment rates (GER) derived from HEMIS 2005:all participants (of any age) as % of 20-24 age-group Source: Scott, Yeld and Hendry 2007

6. Significance of the participation rates • GER in W Europe and N America averages 70% (UNESCO 2007) • If ‘intelligence’ is randomly distributed across populations, current intake (esp. under-represented groups) must be assumed to have good potential to succeed • The view that a large proportion of SA’s current students ‘do not belong’ in higher education is not tenable • Growth must come mainly from under-represented groups • ‘race’ still a major access and redress issue

7. Old patterns • Undergraduate cohort graduation rates after 5 years • 30% overall (est. final graduation rate 44%) • 50% in contact university programmes • 32% in contact ‘technikon’ programmes • patterns similar in a range of qualification types and subject areas Source: DoE; Scott, Yeld and Hendry 2007 • Effects on pipeline to postgraduate study • only a tenth of the PhDs per million of population produced by developed countries

8. Graduation within 5 years by CESM:General academic first B-degrees, excl Unisa

9. Graduation within 5 years: Professionalfirst B-degrees, excl UNISA

10. Equity of outcomes Graduation within 5 years in general academic first B-degrees, excl UNISA • In degree programmes, black completion rate generally less than half the white completion rate • neutralising access gains • <5% of black age-group succeeding in any form of higher education Source: Scott, Yeld and Hendry 2007

11. Graduation in regulation time • In contact degree programmes, predominantly <30% • for black students, predominantly <15% • only 36% graduating within 4 years • Effects on learning of curricula and teaching approaches that are not effective for the majority • Unitary curriculum structures cannot meet the legitimate needs of the (necessarily) diverse intake • Who benefits from the status quo?

12. Some implications of the performance patterns • Graduate output not meeting national needs in terms of ‘economic development or social cohesion’ (Pandor) • The equity and development agendas have converged • catering successfully for student diversity has become a necessary condition for economic development as well as social inclusion • Status quo is failing the majority • implications for all forms of development • The problem is primarily systemic • what parts of the system should address it?

13. Alternatives to reform across higher education? • Alleviating poverty • Improving schooling • Interposing a college sector (FE or wider?) • Institutional differentiation • None of the above • therefore critical for higher education to address contributory factors that are within its control

14. Major factors affecting student success • Curriculum structure • Educational effort and expertise • Holistic approaches to fostering student success

15. Importance of structural curriculum reform • Curriculum as enabling or constraining framework • major determinant of effectiveness of teaching-and-learning in any particular context • SA’s inherited core framework not changed for many decades • Systemic problems requiring systemic responses • in low participation environment, such widespread failure not attributable just to ‘poor teaching’ • evidence from 25 years of foundation/extended programmes • Significance of the ‘articulation gap’ • evidence from 25 years of foundation/extended programmes

16. Importance of structural curriculum reform (2) • What students would benefit from an alternative curriculum structure? • what proportion of the intake? • avoiding the worst of both worlds scenario • importance of understanding from bursary sponsors • Importance of curriculum reform for institutional niche and competitiveness • growing the pool of competent graduates • A majority issue • should we expand extended programmes or be more radical?

17. Proposed new undergraduate curriculum framework • In SA context, not feasible to responsibly address equity, development or curriculum enhancement without extending the ‘formal time’ of core first degrees and diplomas for the majority of the current and future intake • Proposal: that a new undergraduate curriculum framework be established that will, inter alia: • retain the exit standards of current first degrees and diplomas • provide formal time of 4 years as the norm for core first degrees (general academic Bachelors), to meet the needs of the majority of the intake • continue to provide 3-year curricula for these degrees, for those students who can complete in this time • in general, provide the kind of structural flexibility that is needed for the diversity that will characterise the student intake

18. Educational effort and expertise • Effort • ‘If there is a single factor that seems to distinguish colleges and universities that have truly made a difference on behalf of minority students, it is attention.’ (Carey 2008: 8) • Educational expertise necessary for developing fresh approaches to design and delivery • existing approaches not proving effective for accommodating diversity • Implications for HE policy, enabling structures, and reward systems • hearts and minds • how long might it take to change HE culture?

19. Holistic approaches to fostering student success • What we know about the effects of affective factors on student learning • The interaction between institutional culture and student engagement • learnings from the SASSE project (http://sasse.ufs.ac.za) • Implications for bursary sponsors?

20. Where are we going? • The evident difficulty of identifying and focusing on key goals, nationally and institutionally • Are we sure what business we are in? • Distractions • busy work, or change that doesn’t lead to improvement • “reconfiguring the institutional landscape” • now institutional differentiation? • Mobilising organised business as a key stakeholder? • spreading the debate? • developing a cohesive policy position to influence government and institutions?

21. The Lisbon Council (with reference to the EU): • ‘First and foremost, our universities … exist to educate and prepare people to be fully-functioning, well-developed members of our advanced, post-industrial society.’ • ‘… seeking excellence in research should never be allowed to become an excuse for underperformance in the educational tasks [of higher education].’

22. References • Carey, K. 2008. Graduation Rate Watch: Making Minority Student Success a Priority. Washington DC: Education Sector. http://www.educationsector.org/usr_doc/Graduation_Rate_Watch.pdf • Ederer, P., Schuller, P. and Willms, S. 2008. University Systems Ranking: Citizens and Society in the Age of Knowledge. Brussels: The Lisbon Council. • Scott, I., Yeld, N. and Hendry, J. 2007. A case for improving teaching and learning in South African higher education. Higher Education Monitor No. 6. Pretoria: Council on Higher Education. http://www.che.ac.za/documents/d000155/index.php • UNESCO (2007). Education For All Report 2008. Paris: UNESCO.