Working Group on Higher Education
What is the Working Group on Higher Education?
The Working Group on Higher Education (WGHE) was founded in 1989 to
strengthen collaboration between African governments, development agencies
and higher education institutions in order to improve the effectiveness
of external aid and support the revitalization of African universities.
Participants include development agencies supporting higher education
in Africa and representatives of African universities. The lead agency
of the WGHE is the World Bank which works in close collaboration with
the Association of African Universities (AAU) (See Box on page 3). The
involvement of ministries of education is also sought.
What are the objectives of the Working Group?
The working group's global objective is to help African nations reduce
their technological, intellectual and economic dependency by enabling
universities to turn out skilled and knowledgeable graduates capable
of leading their nations into the next century.
Specific objectives are: improving the understanding of the higher
education crisis in sub-Saharan Africa and identifying effective responses;
building a degree of consensus among African governments and development
agencies regarding priorities for funding higher education; testing
remedial responses through collaborative pilot programs; and, fostering
regional capacities for sharing experience and approaches to common
problems.
What is the Working Group's strategy?
The working group's strategy is to promote awareness and understanding
of the problems confronting African universities by supporting analysis
of the issues and disseminating findings. In a context of increasingly
limited resources, the working group promotes strategic planning within
African universities so as to increase the effectiveness and efficiency
of aid. Support to the AAU is given so it can more effectively represent
and advance higher education in Africa.The working group is also a forum
for promoting consensus among agencies concerning priorities and modalities
for funding higher education.
What does the Working Group do?
The central theme for the next two years (1999-2000) will be the use
of information and communication technologies to improve teaching and
learning in African universities. Other activities will include: (i)
three case studies of university reform experience in Africa during
the 1990s; (ii) two university training workshops on strategic planning
methods; (iii) the production and testing of training materials for
members of university governing councils; (iv) production of a directory
of teaching and learning resources for higher education on the Internet;
and, (v) six training workshops for university academic staff on the
use of this directory.
The WGHE will continue to organize meetings to discuss topical issues
in higher education. Recent meetings have focused on the following themes:
female participation; university finance, management and governance;
graduate training programs; distance education at the tertiary level;
higher education policy; and prospects for inter-university cooperation
in graduate training and research.
Achievements
The WGHE has produced a range of studies on higher education issues,
most of which have been carried out by African scholars. Among the more
important papers are an assessment of strategic planning experiences
among African universities, a survey of tertiary level distance learning
programs, and an analysis of the need for a streamlined reporting format
for use by African universities in managing donor funds.
Papers on the future role and mission of African universities were
produced and presented at the AAU/ADEA Joint colloquium in Lesotho in
January 1995. The meeting drew some 300 people from 100 African universities,
governments, regional groups and funding agencies.
The working group has also drawn up a list of priorities for funding
agencies. Priorities included: support to university strategic planning
exercises; elimination of funding of specific projects and greater emphasis
on long term programs or institutional funding that allows for local
input and capacity-building; and, support to multi-country graduate
training programs as well as higher education research.
How to contact the Working Group:
William Saint
Working Group Coordinator:
The World Bank
1818 H Street, N.W.
Washington D.C. 20433,
United States
Tel: +1 202 473 7578
Fax: +1 202 473 8065
E-mail: wsaint@worldbank.org
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