Is Higher Education a Luxury item in Africa?

The In Focus section of the magazine IAU Horizons (Vol. 19 No.3) includes 10 papers focusing on the theme: Student Tuition Fees – perspectives from around the world.
Is Higher Education a Luxury item in Africa? by Chris Gordon, Director Institute for Environment and Sanitation Studies, University of Ghana (cgordon@ ug.edu.gh)
Sub-Saharan Africa has had the lowest tertiary education participation rate of all world regions. The figures from World Bank statistics of Gross Enrollment Ratio in tertiary education for African countries are in single digits, while Malaysia and South Korea are at 36 and 95 respectively. “If you think education is expensive, try ignorance” is a quote attributed to Derek Bok. The saying is applicable at the level of the individual student, a university and indeed a nation. Encouraged by their governments to address this lack of participation many African universities embarked on a programme of massification. This period of explosive growth in student numbers between the 1990s and 2000s, saw in some cases, a tenfold increase in student numbers. The total student population of the University of Ghana was 2,252 in 1967; this went to 8,606 in 1997 and by 2007 had shot up to 29,754.
Read more in the magazine IAU Horizons (Vol. 19 No.3).