Varsities ‘lose focus’ in search for funds
The corporatised attitude to governance of the country’s universities had left some institutions more interested in servicing their corporate clients and donors than in teaching and developing knowledge, the parliamentary budget office said on Tuesday.
The corporatised attitude to governance of the country’s universities had left some institutions more interested in servicing their corporate clients and donors than in teaching and developing knowledge, the Parliamentary budget office said on Tuesday.
Making its final presentation to the fees commission, the budget office expressed concern at the “commodification” of education, with universities more focused on branding, ranking and enterprise development.
Higher education has three main sources of income: government funding, tuition fees and private income.
Director of the office Prof Mohammed Jahed said the increased focus on raising thirdstream income meant that academics felt the pressure to teach more, publish more and raise more third-stream income. He argued that universities now had different clients — not just students and the government, which funded their studies.
Increases in public funding for higher education had not kept pace with the higher education price index, which tracks the main cost drivers. The index shows prices rising at an annual rate of 9.8%, compared with more than 6% for the consumer price index.
Infrastructure and capital expenditure had been below expectations and the system had not kept up with demands for access and transformation. While universities were underfunded, they were expected to take in more students, stretching already limited resources.
Councils, which are meant to focus on strategic imperatives, become more bureaucratic and focused on the bottom line.
The budget office said administration had become a larger part of university costs because of a global trend of outsourcing noncore activities, such as cleaning, as well as the trend of contracting teaching staff while maintaining a smaller complement of permanent staff.
The 2015 student protests, which led President Jacob Zuma to set up the fees commission, were fuelled by calls for an end to outsourcing as well as for feefree education.
Students and unions categorised the practice as coldblooded and condemned the private sector companies that were “making profit out of public sector funding and the exploited labour of workers”. Outsourcing has since been abolished at most universities.
INCREASES IN PUBLIC FUNDING FOR HIGHER EDUCATION HAD NOT KEPT PACE WITH THE HIGHER EDUCATION PRICE INDEX
Policy analyst at the budget office Dr Mmapula Sekatane said the extremely high level of inequality in SA was at the core of the challenges for higher education funding.
Regardless of the funding model to be proposed , the fiscus had to find the money to contribute to lessening the inequalities because there was an overlap between the goals of transforming the economy and redressing the symptoms of historical injustice.
Sekatane said that because of the depth of inequality, the beneficiaries of free higher education would significantly outweigh the elite, as the higher education system was representative of the larger issues regarding socioeconomic development and redress of injustice.