Higher Education In South Africa Research Articles

‘Nothing for us without us’: Exclusion of students with disabilities in disability policy review at a South African institution of higher education

The prominent disability rights slogan ‘nothing for us without us’ which was adopted from the 16th-century Polish revolution ‘nihil de nobis, sine nobis’, means that persons with disabilities, should be involved in anything that concerns their welfare so that they speak for themselves as people with a lived experience of disabilities. This empirical paper explores the participation of students with disabilities in the review of an institutional disability policy in a single institution of higher education in South Africa. Qualitative data were collected through interviews with twelve students with disabilities and seven disability unit staff members. Informed by critical disability theory, the finding was that there was limited participation by students with disabilities in the formulation of institutional disability policy meant for their welfare. While contemporary scholarship on disability seeks to address the exclusion of historically disadvantaged social groups such as those with disabilities but without privileging the voice of those with a lived experience of disability in policy issues, the ‘nothing for us without us’ slogan will remain elusive, fragile and cliché merely chanted. The paper thus aims to contribute to the understanding that limited participation in policy formulation could negatively affect the learning of students with disabilities and consequently their timeous graduation. For genuine inclusion, all students, including those with disabilities will fully participate in higher learning.

Inclusivity and the remote doctorate supervision experience of a student with disability in a South African university

These are personal accounts blended with literature on higher education in South Africa that reveal my experiences as a patient and a disabled online doctoral student. In recovery, I encountered challenges in reading, walking, speaking, and swallowing. Using the narrative technique, this article highlights the academic challenges that I experienced as I transformed into a disabled online doctoral student. To demonstrate the strength of habitus as espoused, the faculty of education demanded an abeyance letter explaining the delay in my doctoral studies. The paper reveals delays in receiving feedback, lack of physical, and intellectual feedback from PhD colleagues and my experience of the burden of critical thinking about doctoral studies. The paper recommends that the Department of education along with higher education institutions should spell out what should be done when a higher education student(s) develops disability(ies)while enrolled and the extent to which they can be included in institutions of higher learning.

An evaluation of the use of Turnitin as a tool for electronic submission, marking, and feedback in higher education in South Africa: Students’ perspective

Turnitin has been operating for over 20 years checking plagiarism in student assessments and giving feedback to improve student writing skills and encourage originality, and over the years the use of Turnitin has been published mainly by lecturers and teachers. Thus, the main objective was to understand and determine the underlining viewpoint of students towards Turnitin as a submission, marking, and feedback tool in higher education. The research involved identifying the benefits and drawbacks of Turnitin as an electronic submission, marking, and feedback tool for students, determining the effectiveness of Turnitin tools for lecturer feedback and identifying the possible implications of Examsoft and Gradescope as marking and feedback tools. Due to the nature of this study, a quantitative approach was adopted with the use of a questionnaire. Data were collected from 51 students at Eduvos from different academic levels and analysed through descriptive statistics using graphs. The results showed that students in South Africa experience benefits of Turnitin such as accessibility and convenience as electronic tools, convenience view for grades, and clear originality reports. The drawbacks were: loss of work after submission, issues with file upload size, negative marking due to no feedback, restricted file types for submission, identification of false positives, and no section for late submissions. It was also evident that the effectiveness of lecturer feedback tools differs per academic level. These findings can be used to enhance students’ academic experience as there were more drawbacks than benefits identified in the study.

The indigenous knowledge system of Credo Mutwa: a pedagogical challenge in higher education in South Africa

This article discusses the vast indigenous knowledge system of the late Sanusi Credo Vusamazulu Mutwa as a critical and relevant pedagogy that can enhance the transformation agenda of an African university. It argues for the inclusion of Mutwa’s indigenous knowledge to form part of knowledge that will interface with other knowledges and be included in institutions of higher learning. It argues that the constant drives for an African university with an Africanised and decolonised curriculum must be entrenched by recognising indigenous knowledge holders as public intellectuals who can through social cohesion engage with scholars and students in higher education. It is a fact that indigenous wisdom remains a challenge and a contested terrain in higher education as it is observed that not only have institutions of higher learning admitted to the calls to decolonise, Africanise and indigenise the curriculum but these calls have been met with failures to recognise the intellectual emancipating knowledge systems of their very own African intellectuals. It is these tendencies that have led to the blindness of these spaces not to adequately recognise the canonical knowledge of Credo Mutwa, an indigenous knowledge system which innervates through various fields of studies.

Positioning the #FeesMustFall Movement within the Transformative Agenda: Reflections on Student Protests in South Africa

This article reflects on the successes and failures of student protests in transforming higher education in South Africa through a Marxist lens. The slow pace of change by the government in addressing structural and systemic inequalities has led to disgruntlement within the student body. In their quest to hasten the process, students engaged in protests across the country, inspired by the #RhodesMustFall movement. This article outlines the problematic areas that have led to the unrest and reflects on the #FeesMustFall movement: the lessons learnt and its impact on contemporary higher education. The reflection further unpacks what it means to be a student in South Africa and how the learning process shapes and is shaped by the student movements within universities. The study reviewed existing literature on the #FeesMustFall movement to better understand the influence of student protests on government policy and to evaluate whether any protest-based changes have occurred in higher education in South Africa.

Comparison of acupuncture education, policies and regulations in South Africa and mainland China

This review compares the landscape of acupuncture higher education in South Africa and mainland China, addressing the question of whether South African acupuncture programs meet international standards, particularly in comparison to their Chinese counterparts. The study explores critical aspects such as the position of acupuncture in the national higher education system, board examinations, core curricula, degree awards, and the integration of acupuncture into national healthcare systems. Divergences are noted in board examinations and continuing professional development, with China requiring comprehensive assessments for registration and imposing annual continuing education credits. The study reveals differences in the scope of practice, influenced by regulatory frameworks and curricula structures. While South Africa faces challenges in establishing acupuncture as a mainstream profession, China has a well-established system with widespread recognition, research funding, and integration into the national healthcare system. The review concludes with recommendations for international collaboration, increased research funding, quality assurance, integration into public healthcare, ongoing professional development, diversification of programs, advocacy for recognition, collaborative conferences, public awareness campaigns, and long-term planning to further elevate acupuncture education in both South Africa and the broader global context.

Preparedness and Response to COVID-19 Disruptions and Learning Challenges for Students with Disabilities in South Africa: A Systematic Review

The present study utilised the systematic review method to report on the learning challenges faced by students with disabilities as a result of inadequate preparedness for COVID-19 and the response to the pandemic in the context of institutions of higher education in South Africa. The studies reviewed indicated that, although there were variations between institutions, South African higher education institutions were inadequately prepared for COVID-19 and, as a result, the response to the pandemic involved emergency remote teaching. For students with disabilities, it was revealed that the limited support and the changes to the way learning was taking place in institutions posed challenges during the pandemic. Limited access to content knowledge was an issue even before COVID-19, and this was exacerbated during the pandemic. Conclusions reached showed that there were challenges imposed by the pandemic in addition to those that existed before, which were only exacerbated and magnified by COVID-19. Practical ways are suggested in which anticipative and transformative resilience could be utilised by all stakeholders in institutions of higher education, to pre-prepare for pandemics. Ways of applying a universal design for learning in the “new normal” to enhance learning for all students, including those with disabilities, also contributed in a practical way to the conclusions.

Glo-ubuntu as an extension of Global Citizenship Education: Cultivating the notion of an African university

In previous work (Waghid et al. 2023) we offered an account of ubuntu and its implications for South African higher education. The main thrust of our argument is constituted by understanding that ubuntu involves interdependent-cum-autonomous human relations that impact university education in expansive ways: independent and collaborative with the possibility of being forward-looking. Yet, what we have not done hitherto, is to examine ubuntu in the realm of global citizenship education, considering the latter seems to intertwine with constitutive aspects of ubuntu. In this article, we reconsider ubuntu with global citizenship education (GCE) and its implications for higher education. Firstly, we proffer an understanding of GCE about pedagogical praxis; secondly, we show how ubuntu can advance GCE within higher education; and thirdly, we examine some of the implications of a glo-ubuntu for higher education in South Africa.

Towards understanding the influence of rurality on students’ access to and participation in higher education

This study examines the experiences of students from rural backgrounds in higher education in South Africa in order to foster more equitable access and participation. Edward Soja’s notion of spatial justice provides a platform for thinking about rurality and its impact on access and success in HE. Soja’s trialectical account means understanding rurality historically, spatially, and socially, and enables exploration of spatial inequalities based on the interplay between rurality and HE. Data was collected within an interpretive, qualitative, case study design through document analysis, interviews, and focus groups. The findings reveal the inequalities that students experience in HE due to their rural backgrounds and the fact that their experiences, abilities, and knowledges are neither acknowledged nor valued in the university, often by the students themselves. This study contributes to understandings of the historical, social, and spatial foundations of inequality in HE and charts future directions for policy and practice.

Changing the Visual Landscape

The national #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall student protests of 2015–2016 at universities across South Africa foregrounded the need for the transformation, decolonisation, redress and Africanisation of the country’s higher education institutions. One of the ways that Stellenbosch University (SU) has endeavoured to address transformation-related challenges linked to symbols and names is with the Visual Redress Project, whose aim is to change the visual landscape of the university’s campuses. This paper explores the reactions of students and staff to initiatives carried out thus far by the Visual Redress project on SU’s Stellenbosch campus. It attempts to contribute to the discourse around the transformation of higher education in South Africa through a look at how social cohesion and the sharing of stories and identities could be achieved on SU’s campus through visual redress. It draws upon and expands on the existing research on visual redress conducted at the University (Fataar & Costandius, 2021; Costandius et al., 2020; Clarke & Costandius, 2019). The paper aims not only to provide insight into SU’s transformation efforts but to also use these responses and reactions to potentially inform future transformation imperatives and redress initiatives in particular on this and other campuses locally and globally.

Student loans: Credit constraints and higher education in South Africa

The empirical evidence that enrollment in higher education is constrained by access to credit is limited and usually indirect. We use a regression discontinuity design based on the fact that student loans are granted according to a score threshold at a South African credit institution (Eduloan) providing short-term loans at market conditions: we find that the credit constraint is substantial, as it reduces enrollment by more than 40 percentage points in a population of mostly middle-class applicants. However, this effect is entirely concentrated on women, and women granted a loan catch up with men’s enrollment levels. This heterogeneity is not explained by lower incomes in the sample of women. It implies that women have lower access to credit, or that their options for managing without a credit are more limited than men’s.

Low-income students, human development and higher education in South Africa: Opportunities, obstacles and outcomes by M. Walker, M. McLean, M. Mathebula & P. Mukwambo (2022). Cape Town, South Africa: African Minds.

Low-income students, human development and higher education in South Africa: Opportunities, obstacles and outcomes by M. Walker, M. McLean, M. Mathebula & P. Mukwambo (2022). Cape Town, South Africa: African Minds.

Editorial

During a meeting of the South African Parliament’s portfolio committee on Higher Education, Science and Technology, held on 1 December 2021, Professor Ahmed Bawa, in his position of Chief Executive Officer of Universities South Africa (USAf), identified eight challenges facing South African universities: the continued impact of COVID-19 on higher education; the sustainability of the National Student Financial Aid Scheme funding (NSFAS); the so-called ‘missing middle’ students, i.e. students who do not qualify for financial aid, but cannot afford fees outright; unpaid student debt; insufficient affordable student accommodation; electrical power instability and loadshedding; social unrest and gender-based violence; and lastly the impact of the faltering South African economy on higher education. In this edition of Perspectives in Education (PiE), the first nine articles focus on challenges faced by students and academic in higher education in South Africa.

Place, Public Good and Higher Education in South Africa

Worsening poverty and inequality continue to affect large segments of the South African population. Universities are critical in contributing to overcoming these challenges. This article looks at the relationship between South African universities and the communities and places in which they are located. The history of South African higher education shows different kinds of relationships with the places in which universities were set. Data collected from interviews in 2018 with key informants in South African universities notes their criticisms of government development policies that lacked vision with regard to the development of place-based relationships for the public good. This data indicates that in the absence of an enabling policy framework to link communities and places, certain universities, individuals who work in them and members of communities around universities have developed their own approaches. I argue that these activities indicate actions by certain members of a spatial community, which can be understood as practices associated with a public sphere. Through this process individuals and institutions can play a central role in defining and contextualising the public good role of universities in their communities.

Rethinking and redefining internationalisation of higher education in South Africa using a decolonial lens

ABSTRACT Over the past few decades, internationalisation of higher education in South Africa has been framed and conceptualised based on the dominant approaches, concepts and definitions from the global North. Using a decolonial lens, we focus on how internationalisation is defined in South Africa. This is important as definitions influence strategic directions, policies and priorities of higher education systems and institutions. We show that replication of Eurocentric definitions is inappropriate for post-apartheid complexities and transformational priorities and contributes to the maintenance of coloniality and Eurocentric hegemony in higher education. We propose a new definition, which is relevant for the South African context and takes into consideration historical complexities and injustices, contemporary socio-economic realities, and the need for epistemic decolonisation. We hope that the new definition will have a progressive impact on different aspects of internationalisation and contribute to transformation and decolonisation of higher education in South Africa and, potentially, elsewhere.

Impact of Emergency Online Learning and Teaching on Mature Part-Time Students

During the COVID-19 pandemic, most institutions of higher education in South Africa, following an international trend, embarked on a mission to save the academic project by resorting to emergency online teaching and learning (EOLTL). The pandemic resulted in mature, part-time, working students being even further marginalised by removing them from university life and the accompanying support services geared to facilitate social, academic and mental well-being. We assumed that the cohort of mature, part-time students (MPTS) would encounter technological and personal challenges that could limit their academic progress.
 Against this backdrop, the dual aim of this study explored the impact of EOLTL on MPTS during the COVID-19 pandemic; and the redesign or readjustment of the curriculum to accommodate and support this cohort of students. A previous, pre-pandemic study, revealed that this group of students experienced significant challenges with balancing work-and-home life in addition to the stress of studying part-time. Subsequently, a questionnaire was designed and piloted with a group of senior students from this cohort to explore the impact of EOLTL. As an ongoing study, this research will report on the findings from the pilot study and compare them to the results of the data obtained from the pre-pandemic study.
 A significant finding of the study indicated that the majority of the students from this cohort coped well with EOLTL and indicated a preference for a more hybrid approach for the future and the remainder of their studies. These findings now challenge universities to find ways to adapt, capitalise on and apply the lessons learnt from the COVID-19 pandemic to benefit MPTS. 
 Based on lessons learnt and experiences during the pandemic, this research has the potential to provide insight into how higher education institutions could improve the provision of support, as well as the learning and teaching experiences of this unique student cohort of mature employed students studying part-time (and others), to ensure retention and academic success.

Exploring technology as enabler for sustainable teaching and learning during Covid-19 at a university in South Africa

This paper discusses the use of technology as enabler for sustaining teaching and learning by reviewing various local and international publications. Since the outbreak of the coronavirus (Covid-19) in 2020, the Departments of Basic and Higher Education in South Africa ordered all institutions of learning to shut down and start using online education as a substitute for face-to-face teaching and learning processes. This sudden transition has without doubt caused an incredible amount of harm and disruption in our education system. In view of this, I am interested in exploring how a traditional, face-to-face university used technology effectively as a delivery tool to sustain teaching and learning during the Covid-19 crisis. The review conducted was aimed at answering the research questions: How can continuity of teaching and learning be strengthened during emergency situations such as that posed by the Covid-19 pandemic? Secondly, what were educators’ and students’ experiences and attitudes towards the use of technology as enabler for sustaining teaching and learning during the Covid-19 pandemic? To answer the research questions, I conducted data searches with the help of librarians and other international primary search source indexes such as ProQuest, EBSCOhost, Educational Resource Information Centre (ERIC), Google Scholar, SAGE and Academic Search Premier. A total of 85 empirical papers were reviewed and analysed so that an aggregated understanding of using technology as enabler could be established. The results of this systematic document review revealed that technology has the potential to provide immediate feedback, improve workloads and access to education, thus making it an agent of sustainability. In addition, the review conducted revealed that Covid-19 reinforced the importance of technology and virtual learning in education.

Navigating through COVID-19 Pandemic Period in Implementing Quality Teaching and Learning for Higher Education Programmes: A Document Analysis Study.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic worldwide, has caused a swift change in the higher education system giving way to a rise in instituting multimodal teaching and learning approaches. These approaches have demonstrated an inadequate capacity for multimodal teaching, particularly through online instruction by many institutions. The Department of Higher Education in South Africa did its utmost best to equip the institutions with the required resources to continue with the provision of education. Methods: A descriptive qualitative research design was followed in the study. The study data source included the South African government’s COVID-19 regulations relating to higher education and training. The purposive sampling method was used to select (8) several government documents relating to the regulation of COVID-19 in higher education and training institutions Document analysis technique was used to collect data from the COVID-19 pandemic regulation documents. Results: the study showed that most HEIs in South Africa adhere to safety measures, ensure business continuity in teaching and learning, continued with the distribution of National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) allowances as allocated by the government, and followed procedures for returning certain categories of students on campuses during the COVID-19 pandemic. Conclusions: The study has evaluated the support for quality higher education teaching and learning during the pandemic period in South Africa. The study, therefore, recommends the continuing of online teaching as part of blended learning so that institutions could always be ready should situations like this occurs again in the future and above be in sync with digital transformation.

Examining the implementation of language policy for access and successof students in higher education in South Africa

The multilingual nature of South African universities requires a multilingual approach towards both administration and academic practice for inclusivity and language equity. While almost all universities in South Africa have language policies, as required by the National Language Policy for Higher Education, a significant impediment to language inclusivity and equity is the implementation of these policies. The purpose of this study is to examine the implementation of a language policy for students’ access and success, and the extent to which African languages are used as academic languages at one historically Afrikaans university (HAU). The study employed a mixed methods approach using probability and purposeful sampling. The findings show that the university’s promotion of monolingualism impedes students’ access to knowledge and limits their academic achievement. Various ways of improving students’ access to knowledge to promote their academic success are discussed. The results also show that African languages continue to be marginalised as academic languages at the HAU. The central recommendation is for a more multilingual approach at this university to increase students’ equitable access to content knowledge and academic success.

Remote Teaching and Learning at a South African University During Covid-19 Lockdown: Moments of Resilience, Agency and Resignation in First-Year Students’ Online Discussions

The aim of article is to analyse the remote teaching and learning experiences of students, as expressed in online discussions among first-year students at a South African university, to enhance understanding of how learning remotely during Covid-19 lockdown affected students’ lives and their academic commitment. The article draws on data collected from 45 students, mainly aged between 18 and 22, registered for an academic literacy course. These students came from diverse racial, socioeconomic and schooling backgrounds, although most were black students. These participants’ Covid-19 and remote learning experiences are used in this case study as qualitative datasets. To generate rich narratives, a set of open-ended questions were designed and posted on the course’s Blackboard page. The questions focused on the socioeconomic, psychological and academic effects of Covid-19 during the lockdown. At the end of the course, a thematic analytical approach was used to identify and categorise participants’ online discussions into key themes. The datasets were then interpreted through the lens of predetermined concepts such as resilience, resilience and agency. The data show that some students saw remote learning as an opportunity to be creative and innovative, but for others, their socioeconomic situation negatively affected their lives and academic commitment. Students’ remote teaching and learning experiences revealed moments of resilience and agency, but also a deep sense of resignation to the socioeconomic and psychological burdens of Covid-19. Based on these findings, this article discusses some implications for the future of higher education in South Africa and recommends possibilities for further research.