KAMPALA, Uganda
The future of thousands of current students and recent graduates at Ugandan universities is danger after it emerged that courses they are pursuing, or completed, are “expired”.
An expired or invalid course,
in this case, is a degree or diploma programme not duly accredited for teaching
by the National Council for Higher Education (NCHE), the sector statutory
regulator.
Such qualifications, said one
highly placed source, are “legally and technically null and void”.
The crisis has come to the
fore after the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom reportedly declined
to admit an alumna of Makerere University, who had studied a Bachelor of
Biomedical Laboratory Technology, to pursue an advanced degree.
“We accept applicants with a
Bachelor’s degree from a Ugandan university with programme accreditation, we
use the NHCE website …,” an official of the University of Bristol wrote in
reply to the Uganda applicant.
The letter added: “The
entry for the Bachelor of Biomedical Laboratory for Makerere University
indicates that this programme was accredited on March 26, 2010 to March 26,
2015 and it expired in 2015. As you graduated in 2018 after the programme
accreditation expired, we are therefore unable to accept your qualification.”
Ms Shamim Nambassa, a
pharmacist and Makerere University’s 87th guild president, who shared the
University of Bristol email on twitter yesterday declined to disclose the
identity of the rejected applicant, citing confidentiality and risk of
stigmatisation.
“Graduates of @Makerere are
missing out on various opportunities because the courses they studied expired
and their accreditation hasn’t been renewed,” Ms Nambassa tweeted, calling for
“as soon as possible” resolution of the glitch.
It is not only Makerere,
Uganda’s oldest and largest public university, in trouble.
Our analysis of the statuses
of various academic programmes tenable at Uganda’s public and private
universities listed on NCHE website https://unche.or.ug/all-academic-programs/
showed that almost all are at fault, meaning the degrees they awarded or plan to
award to graduates who enlisted as students after the courses expired are
invalid.
Section 119A and the
accompanying statutory instrument oblige degree-awarding institutions to ensure
that they, alongside their academic programmes, are accredited by the
regulator.
Our count, however, indicates
that up to 2,260 courses being taught at the 47 public and private universities
expired eight to a dozen years ago, raising questions as to why the
institutions elected not to comply.
At 159, Makerere University has
the highest number of courses categorised on NCHE website as “invalid”,
followed by Bugema and Bishop Stuart universities, tied at 63, Kabale
University (59), Busitema (28), and Mbarara University of Science and
Technology or MUST (34).
Others include Cavendish
University (34), Uganda Christian University (UCU), Makerere University
Business Schools or Mubs (25), Mountains of the Moon University in Fort Portal
(18), All Saints University Lango (14), Ankole Western University (4), and
Avance International University (5).
Only international
universities; Aga Khan University, Apex International University and Clark
University, appeared unaffected.
Prof Mary Okwakol, the
executive director of NCHE, was unavailable yesterday to comment on the
revelations that some senior educationists have said has a wide-ranging impact
on students, graduates, parents/guardians and other education stakeholders.
A senior Council official who
spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak on
the matter, said graduates of “expired” courses will have challenges with their
qualifications, including ineligibility to use them to enroll for advanced
degrees or seek jobs.
“Students who undertook the
courses before they expired are safe. Those who graduated with or are offering
courses that are expired might have their qualifications not recognised,” the
source said.
A scholar knowledgeable about
the process and vitality of accreditation of academic programmes in Uganda was
blunt.
“It simply means degrees
awarded from programme that are not accredited by NCHE are null and void …
universities need to do the right thing and only advertise to admit students on
courses that are accredited. It is illegal to do otherwise,” the academic
noted, asking not to be named to speak freely on the matter.
Parliament established NCHE by
an Act principally to implement the Universities and Other Tertiary
Institutions Act, 2001, assigning it the mandate to guide on the establishment
of institutions of higher learning, their licensing and accreditation as well
as accreditation of their academic programmes.
The statutory regulator ranks
programmes at universities on its website in three categories: “expired”,
meaning unaccredited; “active”, meaning authorised to be taught; and “under review”,
implying accreditation decision pending.
Undergraduate and graduate
programmes declared “expired” at various institutions straddle humanities and
sciences, among them, law, mass communications, business administration, civil
and building engineering, biochemistry, and human medicine.
Majority of these were
accredited for five years from March 2010, or earlier, meaning they should have
been reviewed and re-accredited by or before early 2015.
Sources familiar with the
process intimated to this newspaper that an institution intending to teach a
particular academic programme submits a proposal to NCHE.
The Council then bases its
approval on conformity of specified admission criteria to the law, suitability
of the course components to fulfil knowledge and skill requirement for intended
academic award and whether staffing, facilities and equipment are adequate.
According to another source,
the degree programmes are to be regularly reviewed, in this case every five
years, to incorporate any new knowledge or technology likely to affect delivery
of teaching and learning. Reviews also aim at ensuring staff level often
affected by brain drain, further studies and death are commensurate to the
course requirements.
It is also to inspect whether
available facilities correspond to enrolment on the programme, but the rule
book is that universities promptly stop admitting new students once the
accreditation lapses, according to a subject specialist.
In an interview yesterday, the
chairperson of the Board of NCHE, Prof Eli Katunguka, who also doubles as the
vice chancellor of Kyambogo University that is affected by the “expired”
courses crisis, said some institutions failed to re-accredit programmes because
the exercise is expensive.
He said every course unit
under a programme is accredited at Shs700, 000, meaning a degree programme with
ten units costs Shs7m to be accredited, money he said is hard for universities
to find.
“Kyambogo University applied
for review of 74 programmes and we are required to pay Shs60m.Where shall we
get all this money?” he said.
Every university student pays
Shs20,000 in what is meant as their annual contributions to NCHE, and it
remained unclear how the universities can then fail to muster required
resources for accreditation.
One senior educationist,
speaking on condition of anonymity in order to avoid reprisal, said the lapse
to accredit programmes likely had much less to do with cash than the
laissez-faire attitude of administrators.
“The university administrators
just feel that they are the big boys in higher education [delivery] in the
country and that nothing will happen to them, even if they don’t comply with
the law. They think NCHE will do nothing,” the source said, adding that they
are now being woken up because international institutions have started
rejecting their products.
Prof Barnabas Nawangwe, the
vice chancellor of Makerere University, said they had scrapped most of the
programmes that the regulator presently lists as “expired”, although a few are
still running.
“We are doing everything
possible to address this challenge so that our graduates are not disadvantaged
by a few universities in Europe that insist on using the NCHE website to
confirm accreditation,” he said, adding, “Generally most of the other universities
consider the accreditation of the university and not the programmes and our
graduates have not experienced any challenges with admission to graduate
programmes at those universities.”
MUST Vice Chancellor, Prof
Celestino Obua, yesterday deflected blame on the higher education regulator,
accusing it of failing to accredit programmes submitted for approval two or so
years ago.
“So, if the National Council
has not updated their website, then the problem is theirs, not us,” he said.
Parliament established the
National Council for Higher Education (NCHE) by an Act principally to implement
the Universities and Other Tertiary Institutions Act, 2001.
Its core mandate is to guide
on the establishment of institutions of higher learning and guarantee provision
of high-quality education at universities and tertiary institutions.
NCHE executes its work through
five committees, one of which is on accreditation and quality assurance. Among
the Council’s functions, according to information on its website, is receiving,
considering and processing applications for “the accreditation of the academic
and professional programmes …”It is also responsible for licensing and
accrediting both public and private universities, tertiary institutions and
other degree-awarding institutions.
An institution that intends to
offer a particular academic programme applied to NCHE, setting out the
specifics and NCHE evaluates the worthiness of the programme by examining the
key courses, whether the admission requirements are in conformity with the law
and whether requisite staff, facilities and equipment exist at the institution
to deliver effective programme knowledge and learning.
NCHE does this by deploying an
inspection team whose findings inform grant or denial of licensing or
accreditation. The law makes review of academic programmes at universities
mandatory to accommodate new knowledge or ideas of teaching, incorporation of
technological changes and ensure requisite staffing and facilities/equipment
are in place commensurate to enrolment.
A programme not submitted and
re-accredited after the lapse of a preceding accreditation becomeS invalid and
the respective institution should, under the law, immediately cease admitting
new students or graduating them on such programmes because the academic awards
will not be recognised elsewhere.
Section 119A of the
Universities and Other Tertiary Institutions Act, 2001, provided: “For the
avoidance of doubt, no person shall operate a university, other degree-awarding
institution or a tertiary institution without the prior accreditation of its
academic and professional programmes by the National Council for Higher
Education.”
Expiry of a programme in this
case is not related to the date of graduation, but date of enrolment.
Similarly, Prof George
Openjuru, the vice chancellor of Gulu University, suggested that the NCHE list
that has caused tremors is antiquated.
“There are no expired
[academic] programmes at Gulu University. They are supposed to update and not
just keep [old] records. They are embarrassing us,” he said.
Prof Mouhamad Mpezamihigo, the
vice chancellor of Kampala International University, dozens of whose programmes
are listed as “expired”, said “the issue of the expiration of academic
programmes is really a misunderstood concept”.
“Accreditation of a programme
means that the institution has fulfilled the requirements and you are given
five years. After five years, it does not mean that the programme has expired,
but it can be reviewed,” he said.
Like Kyambogo’s Katunguka, he
revealed that universities have engaged the regulator that the five-year lease
life for accredited courses is too short and should be extended to at least a
decade.
However, Prof Mpezamihigo’s
claim that a programme remains valid past accreditation expiration period
appeared to fly in the face of the law.
An expert explained that
manpower at institutions are often depleted by poaching, retirement, death or
brain drain, meaning that over a period of time, universities have less competence
to teach courses they were previously cleared to offer.
The competing claims
notwithstanding, Mr Bernard Oundo, the president of Uganda Law Society, which
advises government and public entities on matters legal, last evening put
responsibility for the costly omissions and commissions on universities.
“The liability lies with the
universities for not doing due diligence because it’s their obligation to teach
courses that are valid and approved by the regulator, the NCHE,” he told this
newspaper by telephone.
The “impact is big”, one
academic said, referring to the lapse of universities teaching expired
programme, “but there will be a political solution”.
Officials of the Ministry of
Education, which oversees the education sector, were unavailable by press time
to speak to how the affected institutions could dig themselves out of the dark
hole, which opens them to possible litigation by disaffected students and
graduates.
Mr Lawrence Alionzi, the
immediate past Makerere University guild president, said “those who graduated
are the ones who suffer the direct impact of this issue as they are denied
scholarship opportunities when they try to apply outside Uganda”.
“Many students raised these
concerns after their applications were denied in South Africa. The University’s
Academic [Registrar’s Office] did not make this issue a priority. So, in my
view the university has a fair blame,” he said.
He added: “I think the
National Council [for Higher Education] has a problem. They do not give this
matter a priority. There is some kind of reluctance with the Council.”
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