World Bank project set to boost Tanzanian higher education – University World News

TANZANIA

The allocation will be done as part of the World Banks Higher Education for Economic Transformation Project.

According to Dr Roberta Malee Bassett, a senior education specialist at the World Bank, about 80% of the funding will be used to boost enrolments and to improve the quality of teaching at Tanzanian universities.

But the ongoing expansion of Tanzanias upper secondary education, with a current gross enrolment ratio of 7%, is expected to put pressure on the tertiary education system to admit more students.

According to the governments predictions, the demand for higher education is expected to surge to at least 482,000 places by 2030 and, in this case, the World Bank says, there is an urgent need for expansion of university education in Tanzania to accommodate the growth.

Annual enrolment numbers at Tanzanias higher education institutions grew from about 112,000 in 2016-17 to more than 210,000 in 2017-18, thanks to improvements in infrastructure and initiatives to provide higher education loans, but then dropped again as the government closed down some programmes at private universities because of quality concerns.

Tanzanias tertiary gross enrolment rate of 3.1% is one of the lowest in Eastern Africa and lags behind Kenyas 11.5%, Ethiopias 8.1%, Rwandas 6.2% and Ugandas 4.8%, according to UNESCO.

Bassett says the overall quality of post-secondary education in Tanzania is also low and does not adequately prepare university graduates for current and future formal jobs or self-employment.

The reasons for this include a shortage of qualified lecturers. Currently, only 52% of academic staff members have a masters degree and about 33% have a PhD. The rest have lower qualifications.

Outdated teaching methods

The World Bank notes that many lecturers are not trained in the use of the latest technical developments and global knowledge in their fields, and use outdated, mostly lecture-based teaching methods, [thereby] limiting the development of adequate competencies among students.

Although the Tanzanian economy needs more skilled workers, many university graduates have struggled to find jobs.

The reasons for this include a mismatch between the skills that are taught and those that are in demand on the labour market. Curricula and teaching and learning facilities in Tanzania are often outdated, the World Bank says.

In terms of the project, several public universities have been selected to become high-quality centres of learning that will focus on priority areas.

These universities include the Muhimbili University of Health and Allied Sciences, the University of Dodoma, the Moshi Cooperative University, the Dar es Salaam University College of Education, the Mkwawa University College of Education, the Sokoine University of Agriculture, the Mbeya University of Science and Technology, the University of Dar es Salaam and the Open University of Tanzania.

Bassett says 14 priority areas have been selected based on the key disciplines required to build the countrys industrial economy and propel its development agenda.

These areas include engineering and technology, information communication and technology, material sciences, health sciences, urban and environmental engineering and technology and renewable energy. Others are water resources, climate change, agriculture, wildlife conservation, tourism and hospitality, academic industry linkages, humanities, and education.

The challenge is to build a higher education system with the capacity to provide skills and create jobs for the growing number of young people entering the labour market each year. Although Tanzania has, in the past 10 years, expanded access to education, only 9% of the labour force has completed secondary education and just 1.3% has a university education.

Looking for jobs

About one million young people have been entering the Tanzanian labour market annually since 2015. By 2030, this number is projected to reach 1.6 million per year, the World Bank says in the project report.

The project will also assist universities to promote an inclusive and equitable environment for students with disabilities. Specifically, this will include renovation and the rehabilitation of classrooms and lecture rooms to suit special-needs education, as well as the construction of hostels, specialised examination rooms and resource centres for students with disabilities.

The project also has an explicit focus on reducing gender gaps while increasing access to higher education for both women and men. Bassett says special attention will be given to disabled women, women living with albinism, and women from vulnerable groups who may be more subjected to barriers to higher education by negative socio-cultural factors.

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World Bank project set to boost Tanzanian higher education - University World News