Putting the data to work

STATISTICIAN-GENERAL Pali Lehohla is a “Freakonomics” man who looks at the world through data. Like the best-selling economist-journalist duo who popularised the term in their application of economics tools in understanding everyday problems, Lehohla has given new insight to the problems bedevilling universities as they struggle to manage the fallout of #FeesMustFall by turning to the numbers.

He says the reason free higher education is not achievable is because education never ranked as a top priority on the list of South African priorities, which was focused on service delivery. Added to that is that the system suffers from “constipation”.

Talking data, Lehohla said the income of tertiary institutions last year was R63.1 billion versus expenditure of R54.1bn. But, in the manner of Freakanomics, he said, there were 170 000 first-year students of a total of 521 000 undergraduates. When combined with postgraduate students, the overall total should be 600 000, yet there were close to 1million students at university.

The surplus are students who are clogging up the system, burdening universities and adding to the enormous cost because they cannot complete their degrees in the allocated time.

In his “Inside Statistics” piece for Business Report this week, he elucidates on the quarterly Labour Force survey and shows that students can in fact contribute to the cost of their education through deferred payment, because more than 90% of those who graduate will become employed and earn an income.

But, he found, fees are not properly structured and the environment is not always conducive to success, with the system now further challenged by the ongoing disruptions, which affect not only the universities but the broader labour market and school education too.

What we like about Lehohla is that he puts the data to work in understanding South Africa’s challenges; in this case the impact of #FeesMustFall, and in doing so offers some idea of where we need to go to find solutions.