PhD shortage: Govt to address high cost of doctoral training

The Government has asked more Ugandans to take up doctoral studies to solve the shortage of doctor of philosophy degrees (PhDs) in the country.

According to Dr Jane Egau Okou, Director in charge of Higher Education and TVET at the Ministry of Education and Sports, not many Ugandans are demonstrating interest in pursuing doctoral education, which has left the country short in that area.

She said that the low appetite for doctoral studies owes in part to the high expenses of financing doctoral education, which costs upwards of sh50m, which many find unaffordable.

Egau receives a bouquet of flowers from ISBAT University officials on arrival at the university for the PhD launch. (Photo by by Vivien Nakitende)

Egau said the government hopes to enter more bilateral partnerships with development partners to support doctoral education. She said they are hopeful that this can create many opportunities for Ugandans to study the program, mostly abroad.

She was speaking on Saturday (September 30) as ISBAT launched its maiden PhD degree programs at the university’s premises in Kampala.

The launch came after the National Council of Higher Education (NCHE) recently cleared the university to teach the PhD in Information and Communication Technology and PhD in Business and Management.

Presiding over the event, Egau congratulated ISBAT on reaching the milestone, noting that that is a testament of the institution’s “vision, dedication and belief in the transformative power of education and research.”

“I have no doubt that graduates of these programs will go on to make significant contributions to their societies and Uganda at large,” she said.

 “I am happy that we are going to have people coming in with ICT, which is a very critical area for the development and transformation of the country and we need more people in that area. This is a landmark program that will address the shortage in the ICT sector.

“This Program will produce visionary researchers and leaders who will drive complex problems and shape the future of technology. Graduates of this program will contribute significantly to bridging the technology divide gap and foster technology advancement that will benefit society and Uganda as a whole.”

Dr Jane Egau Okou speaking during the launch of ISBAT University maiden PhD degree programs. (Photo by by Vivien Nakitende)

Pradeep Kumar, the director of academic affairs at ISBAT, called for more incentives for universities to commit more towards producing PhDs. He noted that more PhDs would give Uganda the capacity to compete on the international stage.

Dr Tom Nsubuga, the head of research at ISBAT, revealed that part of the support to run the programs will come from grants from abroad, including Spain. “We also recently reached out to Private Sector Foundation Uganda (PSFU), who have committed to support us,” he said.

PhD shortage explained

According to NCHE, a university is supposed to have 60 percent of its staff with PhDs, but it has been difficult to achieve this requirement in both public and private institutions in Uganda due to the shortage of PhDs in the country.

Currently, there are 54 universities in Uganda. But only about 1197 PhDs have been awarded in Uganda between 1970–2020, according to a recent research paper published in the Makerere Journal of Higher Education.

Public universities awarded about 1025 PhDs, of these, and 923 (90.2 percent) were awarded by Makerere University. Private universities awarded only about 172 PhDs.