Paying fees upfront will frustrate needy students
Feb 15, 2010
Makerere University has, for long, been lenient with fees paying students, allowing them a considerable grace period to pay up their fees prior to examinations. This leniency had its own shortcomings as the university could not amass funds in advance to assist in its financial operations.
By Barbara Natifu
Makerere University has, for long, been lenient with fees paying students, allowing them a considerable grace period to pay up their fees prior to examinations. This leniency had its own shortcomings as the university could not amass funds in advance to assist in its financial operations.
Recently, the acting vice-chancellor of Makerere University, Prof. Venansius Baryamureeba issued a directive that all tuition fees be cleared by February 15, if a student wanted to be considered as a registered student of Makerere University with permission to sit for tests and examinations.
This decision in itself is well intentioned as it aims at managing and controlling the collection of revenue for a university that has been and continues to be affected by Government under funding. The Government’s attention is directed to primary and secondary universal education.
In her book Whose Education for All? Brock-Utne asks whether there is a future for higher education in Africa after the Jomtien conference of 1990, and the formulation of the ‘Education-for-All’ World Bank strategy.
The strategy urged that the proportion of education lending going to higher education be reduced from 40% to 30% and that the lending to primary and basic education be increased from 11% to 27%. While the Bank’s decision had the intention of availing and laying the foundation for a basic education for many, rather than a ‘small privileged few’; 20 years down the road, higher education institutions are still battling with the implications of the 1990 ‘Education-for-All’ policy.
Due to underfunding of the higher education institutions, in the early 1990s, affected universities in Africa and elsewhere in the world resorted to cost sharing measures. Things like introduction of fees paying students to generate revenue, a move that has enabled some universities to endure the global economic down turn and is shaping the debate of whether higher education yields more of private than public benefits.
Increased reliance on tuition fees as a means of financing higher education institutions is inevitable, however, to say that all students pay their tuition fees upfront is to deny a number of Ugandans the right to access a higher education.
The resonating undertones suggest a scenario where higher education has become more of a preserve for the rich. This directive also ignores the earnings of an average Ugandan which is approximately sh300,000 to sh400,000 per month. Approximately 70% of Ugandans are peasants by occupation, earning very little for subsistence.
Furthermore, the system of upfront fees has been seen to provoke bitter controversy in countries like Scotland, UK and Australia, writes Maureen Woodhall, in her article Financing Higher Education: Old Challenges and New Messages.
Such countries abolished upfront fees and resorted to introduction of graduation contribution schemes to which graduates could ‘contribute’ through the income tax system.
The drawback in implementing such a scheme in some African states such as Uganda could be the lack of an efficient national registry, weak structures when it comes to collecting and recording graduate incomes accurately over time.
However, the income contingent loan scheme is prominent in many parts of the world including several African countries such as Ghana, Nambia, South Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania.
On the issue that higher education yields more of private than public benefits, upon completing one’s studies, whether one finds employment in government or the private sector, one does make a contribution towards nation building.
Much as the lion’s share of the benefits of higher education accrue to the individual pursuing that end, the societal and public contributions too, exist in subtle and unobtrusive ways, making the debate all the more complex.
Prof A.B. Kasozi in his book Financing Uganda’s Public Universities alludes to the fact that higher education is a public good because it is valuable for society as wells as for individuals.
If Ugandan institutions, key think tanks and the public consider and recognise an educated populace as a major contributor to eradication of poverty and nation building; then the plight of students who will be unable to meet the upfront fee directive should be taken seriously.
This issue of fees payments should be addressed in Parliament and given legislative backing that offers sustainable policies such as government funded student loans or grant projects that could afford Education-For-All’ at all levels — primary, secondary and tertiary.
Whereas continents such as Europe and North America might have moved to a stage where higher education has shifted from being a public good, knowledge learning regime to an academic capitalist regime complete with copyrights, trademarks and patenting of knowledge, most of Africa still views higher education as a holistic system.
One that includes not only human capital contribution, but also economic and social development contributions.
The Government should quickly workout a way of sorting Uganda’s higher education challenges.
The writer is a PhD-student,
Department of Media and Communication,
University of Oslo
Makerere University has, for long, been lenient with fees paying students, allowing them a considerable grace period to pay up their fees prior to examinations. This leniency had its own shortcomings as the university could not amass funds in advance to assist in its financial operations.
Recently, the acting vice-chancellor of Makerere University, Prof. Venansius Baryamureeba issued a directive that all tuition fees be cleared by February 15, if a student wanted to be considered as a registered student of Makerere University with permission to sit for tests and examinations.
This decision in itself is well intentioned as it aims at managing and controlling the collection of revenue for a university that has been and continues to be affected by Government under funding. The Government’s attention is directed to primary and secondary universal education.
In her book Whose Education for All? Brock-Utne asks whether there is a future for higher education in Africa after the Jomtien conference of 1990, and the formulation of the ‘Education-for-All’ World Bank strategy.
The strategy urged that the proportion of education lending going to higher education be reduced from 40% to 30% and that the lending to primary and basic education be increased from 11% to 27%. While the Bank’s decision had the intention of availing and laying the foundation for a basic education for many, rather than a ‘small privileged few’; 20 years down the road, higher education institutions are still battling with the implications of the 1990 ‘Education-for-All’ policy.
Due to underfunding of the higher education institutions, in the early 1990s, affected universities in Africa and elsewhere in the world resorted to cost sharing measures. Things like introduction of fees paying students to generate revenue, a move that has enabled some universities to endure the global economic down turn and is shaping the debate of whether higher education yields more of private than public benefits.
Increased reliance on tuition fees as a means of financing higher education institutions is inevitable, however, to say that all students pay their tuition fees upfront is to deny a number of Ugandans the right to access a higher education.
The resonating undertones suggest a scenario where higher education has become more of a preserve for the rich. This directive also ignores the earnings of an average Ugandan which is approximately sh300,000 to sh400,000 per month. Approximately 70% of Ugandans are peasants by occupation, earning very little for subsistence.
Furthermore, the system of upfront fees has been seen to provoke bitter controversy in countries like Scotland, UK and Australia, writes Maureen Woodhall, in her article Financing Higher Education: Old Challenges and New Messages.
Such countries abolished upfront fees and resorted to introduction of graduation contribution schemes to which graduates could ‘contribute’ through the income tax system.
The drawback in implementing such a scheme in some African states such as Uganda could be the lack of an efficient national registry, weak structures when it comes to collecting and recording graduate incomes accurately over time.
However, the income contingent loan scheme is prominent in many parts of the world including several African countries such as Ghana, Nambia, South Africa, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania.
On the issue that higher education yields more of private than public benefits, upon completing one’s studies, whether one finds employment in government or the private sector, one does make a contribution towards nation building.
Much as the lion’s share of the benefits of higher education accrue to the individual pursuing that end, the societal and public contributions too, exist in subtle and unobtrusive ways, making the debate all the more complex.
Prof A.B. Kasozi in his book Financing Uganda’s Public Universities alludes to the fact that higher education is a public good because it is valuable for society as wells as for individuals.
If Ugandan institutions, key think tanks and the public consider and recognise an educated populace as a major contributor to eradication of poverty and nation building; then the plight of students who will be unable to meet the upfront fee directive should be taken seriously.
This issue of fees payments should be addressed in Parliament and given legislative backing that offers sustainable policies such as government funded student loans or grant projects that could afford Education-For-All’ at all levels — primary, secondary and tertiary.
Whereas continents such as Europe and North America might have moved to a stage where higher education has shifted from being a public good, knowledge learning regime to an academic capitalist regime complete with copyrights, trademarks and patenting of knowledge, most of Africa still views higher education as a holistic system.
One that includes not only human capital contribution, but also economic and social development contributions.
The Government should quickly workout a way of sorting Uganda’s higher education challenges.
The writer is a PhD-student,
Department of Media and Communication,
University of Oslo