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By Edwin Naidu
South Africa’s tertiary education sector is urgently grappling with sustainability challenges amidst sluggish economic growth and the disruptive influence of digitalisation and artificial intelligence on the global job market, as highlighted by Universities South Africa (USAf) CEO Dr Phethiwe Matutu.
“In the light of global and local crises and unprecedented technological advancements, South African universities may be at a turning point in history,” Matutu added.
Reflecting on “The Future of the University” at a three-day conference at the CSIR in Pretoria, Matutu made it clear that the higher education sector was facing enormous sustainability challenges due to slow economic growth.
This was further exacerbated by the profound and transformative impact of digitalisation and AI on the world of work in general.
The conference explored current and developing trends in higher education and how they impacted universities’ core functions of teaching and learning, research and engagement, leadership and management, transformation, and how institutions positioned graduates for the future world of work and economic participation.
“A sluggish economy has resulted in high levels of unemployment and declining state subsidies. How universities respond to these and global changes (including climate variability, adaptability and environmental sustainability) will determine not only the future of the university, but that of society and humanity,” she said.
USAf chairperson Prof. Francis Petersen, the new Vice-Chancellor of the University of Pretoria, highlighted the conference’s collaborative nature.
It brought together local and international university leaders, researchers, policymakers, educators and industry experts, tapping into their collective wisdom and engaging in impactful conversations about sustaining the future of universities in South Africa and globally.
Petersen acknowledged the challenges but also highlighted the potential for positive change.
He said that while global crises have impacted SouthAfrican universities and they were still confronting historical and structural inequalities, positive change was possible.
The ever-evolving challenges related to rapid technological advancements in developing countries, inadequate governance and deepening financial and sustainability crises can be opportunities for growth and improvement.
“As knowledge-producing and critical citizenship development institutions, universities have a special and vital role. They are beacons of hope and are institutions for human progress and development,” he said.
Key topics deliberated on, included:
• Technology and human interface in the future university;
• Higher education funding and financial sustainability;
• Academic freedom;
• Research and innovation strategies in relation to declining resources;
• Climate change, environmental issues and the future of the university;
• Artificial intelligence and teaching and learning in the future university.
Petersen said global themes and topics surrounding the university’s future ignited thinking around critical higher education focus areas interlinked with the future of humanity.
“We can only gain deeper insights into what the sector’s future may look like through interactive engagement with the multiple stakeholders within the industry.”
He said universities significantly impact society’s advancement.
They shape the education system, produce and hone skills and competencies needed for the economy, contribute to scientific discoveries, advancements, and innovations, and shape society’s overall progress.
Petersen noted that the conference took place after a significant disruption to the higher education system and social life caused by global catastrophes such as the Covid-19 pandemic, contributing to a vastly different reality on local campuses.
“Covid-19 led to a rapid online pivot in universities while ongoing, quick-paced technology developments in AI were underway. During all this, universities must remain at the forefront of the digital revolution and map their future paths while doing so.
“Slow adaptation to rapid digitalisation can only be to the sector’s detriment,” he warned.
“As universities navigate this complex terrain, it is imperative to critically reflect on past practices while charting pathways toward a more inclusive, equitable and responsive system.”
That is why USAf, recognising the need for strong and effective universities, was working through its six strategy groups (funding, leadership and management, research and innovation, teaching and learning, transformation, and the world of work) to promote cohesive, but diverse public universities that served society.
Identifying sustainable funding was vital for the future of universities. This included examining the state subsidy model, the National Student Financial Aid Scheme modeland its sustainability, and university fee regulations.
Former University of the Witwatersrand vice-chancellor Prof. Adam Habib, who is now the Vice-Chancellor of SOAS, University of London, told delegates that while there was positivity over transforming South Africa’s tertiary system from apartheid to democracy, its success hid significant structural fault lines in the country’s higher education sector.
He said that the university system had not achieved the programmatic differentiation envisaged at the turn of the century, instead degenerating into homogenisation and vertical stratification based on reputation.
As a result, he said the incentive structure for research subsidies and the ranking systems had pushed all universities to try to be like each other, undermining the programmatic and functional differentiation that would allow institutions to produce the diverse human capital base required for South Africa’s economic and social development.
In his address, ‘Reflections on Post-Apartheid Higher Education: Looking Back, Going Forwar’, Habib said his reflections touched on higher education policy and highlighted successes, failures and blind spots, especially as they speak to the future.
Habib’s keynote address contained five lessons from the past that could shape the future:
• Leadership matters. This leadership needs to speak to our context. In South African universities, this means enabling access, ensuring a quality education, and building a financially sound institution.
• Institutional and national citizenship cannot simply emerge from education and acculturation; consequences must be applied to malevolent behaviour. There is no better case study for this than the issue of violence.
• Capabilities matter. If there is a central lesson to be learned from Covid-19, it is that ordinary citizens are the primary victims of a lack of capabilities within the state.
• How we spend is as important as how much we spend. This basic principle, common to most households in our country, is lost on most public institutions and funding regimes.
• Finally, stewardship and governance of public institutions matter.
He said these five lessons were intertwined and that it was impossible to address collective challenges without a comprehensive response that included, among other things, the five lessons identified.
“We have in effect become what we most hate: a segregated society, defined perhaps not by the formal legally enforced rules of race, but definitely by the informal rule of money. This future will consolidate unless we demonstrate the courage and the political will to act now to stop the rot,” Habib said.
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