African higher education in the 21st century

IAU Horizons, the Association's news and information magazine is addressed primarily to IAU Member Institutions and Organizations, but is also sent to a selected audience beyond the IAU Membership such as Ministries of Higher Education, international organizations, national and regional associations of universities and others.
African higher education in the 21st century (IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2)
By Heila Lotz-Sisitka, Murray & Roberts Chair of Environmental Education and Sustainability and Professor Rhodes University, South Africa and by Mahesh Pradhan, UNEP, Director of Education and Training. What direction for education in the 21st century? how should higher education in Africa prepare young leaders for the future? These questions are significant, since Africa is soon to be the world’s most youthful continent. An expanding network of African professors and their leaders have been meeting and working on these problems since 2004 when the Mainstreaming Environment and Sustainability in African Universities (MESA) programme was initiated through the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the African Association of Universities (AAU), in partnership a number of other global and regional organisations and universities as a flagship programme of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development.
Since its establishment MESA network has expanded in scope and size. Today it is possible to find that approximately one quarter of Africa’s universities are engaged in various environment and sustainability curriculum and campus innovations. Capacity building for university staff is an important feature of the programme, and training programmes exist that connect faculty in Africa with faculty in Asia and in other parts of the world. The various training programmes associated with MESA already have over 300 alumni. Through wider interest in the MESA programme, UNEP has turned the programme to a global initiative named the Global Universities Partnership for Environment and Sustainability (GUPES) which will be launched in Shanghai as an associated event of Rio+20.
But what has resulted from this continental network? There is evidence of at least 100 different curriculum and campus innovations. These range in scale, from single subject changes, to whole new degree programmes which have been launched and funded as a result of faculty participation in MESA. The University of zambia for example introduced a Bachelors of Environmental Education degree, with hundreds of young people applying for it each year, while the University of Cape Town has restructured its entire Environmental Law programme, with new staff appointed. The kigali Institute of Technology in Rwanda started an innovative community engagement and training programme based on the bio-digestors designed at kIST. This has provided skills development and entrepreneurship opportunities for hundreds of prisoners and youth. The universities of Jomo kenyatta University in kenya, the University of Swaziland and others have developed and implemented Education for Sustainable Development policy frameworks for the entire university. These are just a few of the results emerging from the networking and professional development opportunities that have emerged from MESA across the continent.
At the core of the initiative is a commitment to transformative learning, and a ‘Change Project’ concept, in which all participating faculty or university leaders choose what they can and would like to change in their universities to improve education in ways that strengthen sustainable development on the continent. In the final analysis it is this self-directed, emergent model of change that has proven to be successful as it allows for ongoing, reflexive change in a context where many change initiatives have failed because of their top down or ‘outsider driven’ orientation. Future goals of MESA are to continue with this movement for change in universities; to expand international exchange opportunities and access to the latest knowledge resources and policy developments on environment and sustainability through networking and training. UNEP are developing curriculum guidelines to strengthen curriculum innovations, and support for Green Economy programme developments in universities. The vision of MESA academics is a continent free of poverty, where Africa’s people have the knowledge, values and capabilities necessary to develop the continent sustainably, peacefully and equitably for current and future generations. Read more in IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2.