The Higher Education Summit re-opens the debate on differentiation
Date
2010-08
Authors
Cherry, Micheal I.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
AOSIS OpenJournals
Abstract
South African Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe opened the Higher Education Summit in April 2010 by putting his finger on the nub
of the problem – the fact that over 65% of 18–24 year olds in South Africa are neither working nor engaged in any form of further education
or training. Of those who were in 2008, 875 000 were enrolled at universities and 640 000 at Further Education and Training colleges. At
universities, 35% of students drop out of degree studies, 52% out of certificate or diploma studies and 70% out of distance higher education,
whereas, only about 29% of those who enrol at colleges eventually pass. In both categories, only a minority complete their qualifications
in the prescribed period (for case studies of three universities see http://www.che.ac.za/documents/d000206/). When assessing the
significance of these statistics, two things become clear. Firstly, the 70% increase in higher education enrolment since 1994 has been achieved
at a price and, secondly, a sensible way must be found to provide some kind of tertiary qualification for additional school leavers.
Description
The original publication is available at http://www.sajs.co.za/
Keywords
Higher education, Summit, Debate, Differentiation
Citation
Cherry, M.I. 2010. The Higher Education Summit re-opens the debate on differentiation. South African Journal of Science, 106(7/8), doi:10.4102/sajs.v106i7/8.368