Persistent Challenges Facing Higher Education Institutions (HEIS) in South Sudan

By Ustaz John Garang Ayii Riak, Zhejiang, China

Monday, March 16, 2020 (PW) — After South Sudan got independence in July 2011, one of the greatest persistent problems it challenged was structuring Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) of learning. Many people think that the HEIs will improve by getting a reasonable national budget from the government and well-wishers, but again, South Sudan’s HEIs problems increased by experiencing new form of problems adding to the existing ones.

Higher Education in South Sudan refers to the education offered at post-secondary level. The HE system is refers to the education offered after secondary school, or HE is any institution above the high school level, Colleges, universities and technical schools are called institutions of higher education where students can enroll in diploma, associate, degree or 4 or 5-year degree programs or Master Degree and PhDs. Institutions are splits into three sub-sectors: Universities, Other Degree Awarding Institutions (ODAI) and Other Tertiary Institutions (OTI) sub sectors. Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are institutions where students are required not only to acquire knowledge but also contribute effectively in producing it as well as developing their critical faculties (John Garang, Feb 2^nd, 2019).

A problem, in general terms, is the discrepancy between ideal situation and the actual or real situation. Everyone, for example, wants to have food, clothing and shelter, if he she has a problem. Similarly, if a student is unable to raise money for his / her fees he / she has a problem. If there is insecurity in an area has or people in the area have problems (J.C Otullu, 2013). If a man defiles a school girl it is (the man is) a problem. A problem therefore, occurs or manifests in various forms. It may be qualitative or quantitative. It may be lack or inadequacy of what one desire or needs or it may be presence of what one does not desires or needs.

All education system in the world variably has problems in the five principal features-objectives, inputs, internal process, outputs and ultimate benefit which may be broadly or summarily expressed as problems in the article under relevance of education higher system, problems of students drop outs, managerial and administrative factors, democratization of education, financing education etc.

Common problems facing by HEIs Managers

Insufficient financing is a key common disturbing Higher Education Institutions (HEIS) in South Sudan. According to Prof John A. (2016), the resources available to HEIs in South Sudan and still inadequate to facilitate them to successfully respond to the rapid expansion in student enrolment and rudimentary requirement for quality education and research work. As a result, the quality of teaching and research has been pretentious and staff and students well-being remain to deteriorate. Fascination and retaining of well trained and skillful professionals in South Sudan continue to be a big challenge.

The inadequate funds affects more than the ability to hire qualified teachers in the right amounts. Any university also needs lecture theatres, constant electricity and the means to commute to and from the university. The current labor market needs understanding with contemporary technology, flexibility, creativity, and social intelligence. The aim of higher education is to bind skills and instill values in the youth so that they are able to participate and contribute to the development of their societies and nation. Nevertheless, the lack of technological apparatuses on campus such as computers limits learners, setting them up for unemployment. The deprived condition of school facilities discourages students who are partaking of to highly-demanded labor market skills from attending school in South Sudan observed by the VAD Foundation (Sept, 2016).  

Exodus of Teaching Staff; the poor pay has generated a massive exodus of academics staff from the higher education sector. Over the year between 2016-2018, more than 20% of professors at public universities have taken leave without pay to join the NGO sector or migrate to greener pastures abroad. At the University of Juba alone, 143 professors – or 24% of teaching staff – left over the last year the same to Dr. John Garang University and other three public Universities. Things can only get worse according to Prof. John Akec (Mar 20^th 2019). For instance, Dr. John Garang Memorial University got enough lecturers and professors between 2010-2013 from USA, Canada, and Australia but due to adequate payment and insecurity made this University’s human resources departed with international experiences and knowledge which left negative effects on the university education thus a key challenge heartrending higher education sector in South Sudan (John Garang, 2019).

Insecurity in and around tertiary and universities Insecurity is another fundamental reason affecting the HEIs in South Sudan. For instance, Juba University’s students and professors laptops are takes during day time by Toronto boys around the university around Tumbura road and Char Facebook. These areas have attracted large numbers of criminals who have settled around them. Insecurity within and outside university is grounded, with many belongings of students killed or injured specially those who go home between 8:00 p.m-9:00p.m lectures. Students belongings are stolen at the university especially laptops. Often students lose bags with valuables when sitting examinations because of these gauges goes into the campus unknowingly because of overcrowded and congestions (Dduma, 2015).

Overcrowded of lecture halls; this is also a challenge to the HEIs.  This is because some courses have large number of students who share some course especially in the Management sciences and education units because they are emerged together for the lectures. The result of this reduced meditation of the students in class and depresses capacity of the students to understand whatever is being taught in class. In addition to the above is the condensed school practices in most of these HEIs are also a challenge in the country (Dr. Peter A. 2018).

Strikes are also problem affecting the HEIs to Prof Akech (2019), the problem of strikes at public universities have dragged on seasonally for long with students protesting against tuition increment or lecturers over unpaid, demand for salary increment among others.  However, most of the strikes are caused by academic staff welfare related matters. The implication of this is that time wasted is at times not reimbursed for specially when the strike has taken one to 3 weeks as the university calendar rests  unchanged.  This would   preferably mean that some courses with much content cannot be well covered hence affecting learning and then the quality of graduate.

Administrative defies. The students complain of bureaucratic tendencies where getting ones problematic solved to is a long and annoying process. Overcrowded and slow services, consequently students end up in self-medication to save time, poor record keeping where some records of results cannot be found in students re-sitting or in the computer because of virus due to lack of anti-virus and online recording system which is very discouraging coupled with lack of confidentiality since results are just pinned on the notice boards for all the students (John A, 2019).

Unreliable power and water supply is also one of the challenges to the HE. In many HEIs power blackouts and shortage of fuel or crash down of standing generator are rampant which inclines to affect normal learning and studying process of the students at the HEIs. These mostly disturb learners studying on evening hours and have lectures up to around 10 pm. In addition to this is also the challenge of water shortage especially to the resident students within the Campus. These disturb the student’s usual learning process thus poor academic performance.

Limited public tertiary and university institutions; the higher education sector is made up of tertiary institutions and university, which together provides huge possible for the development of the country. In South Sudan, however, there has been destruction of tertiary institutions over the years during Civil War between SPLA and Sudan government around 1983-2005 and again during 2013-2016 civil wars. These five public universities have witnessed decline due to the civil wars and under-funding and some of them have been annihilated universities, for example Dr. John Garang-MUST and Upper Nile were burnt down and all the facilities were looted by the former South Sudanese SPLM IO rebel groups. Since, the public universities are very limited; students and parents fight to get a vacancy in these five public universities such as Juba, Dr. John Garang University, Upper Nile, Bhar El Ghazal and Rumbek Universities.

There are also growing universities in the country such as Catholic, KU, KIU, St.Mary, Star International, and Star Ford Universities. These universities seemed to be many, but they cannot take all the students who completed senior this make students accumulated because those who remained to join the university intended to join another year, yet other students sit and apply together with them this make admission committee to take the fresh one leaving out the last year budgets. This has absolutely deprived of the economy, the essential and distinctive skills produced from these institutions thus a key challenge affecting the HEIs in my country.

Low salaries paid to academic and non-academic staff is also a key problem. The salaries paid to the staff in higher institutions of education in South Sudan are still very little compared to those in other countries. Due these tutors and professors incline to dodge lectures since most have other contracts in good paying institutions and companies to supplement the insufficient salaries which cannot satisfy for their basic needs. Lecturers are demanding a pay rise that would bring their salaries into line with their colleagues in the East African region. Salaries are very low if it’s compare with lecturers in Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya and Rwanda and the consequences of this, is that syllabus coverage is very low at the end of the semester which makes students   get less of what they were intended to study in a course in addition to absenteeism by the lecturers are key challenges affecting the HEIs in South Sudan. According to Prof. John A. (March 7^th , 2019) said that low wages have forced professors and lecturers to seek work abroad, expressing concerns that the country may be left without experienced academic staff. So we are losing staff and we are not attracting people, he said which is the big problem facing the country.

Bureaucracy in the Ministry of Higher Education. Propensities of bureaucracies are major characteristics of the higher education in South Sudan. The outcome of such a propensity is the difficulty to access the higher education services. For instance, South Sudan has a tertiary Gross Enrolment Ration (GER) OF 4.5% which is the lowest in East Africa region (East African News, 2017). Students who qualify for public higher education cannot all access admission due to bureaucracies involved in the admission process Ministry for Higher Education. Admission are supposed to be issued by the University, but due arabization, Islamization, and Sudanization system copied from Sudan and pasted in South Sudan says that all the admissions are processed in the Ministry of Higher Education, which is totally wrong. The universities supposed be given freedom to determine who to admit and how many students are supposed to admits. Therefore this is a key factor to the HE in the nation (Abraham M. 2017).

Research Centers, Publications and innovations; There are no research and publication centers in the country, the current situation in South Sudan shows that the research element of higher education has continued to be ignored although it is research that differentiates a university from other institutions of learning. Funding for research has become more difficult to access since 2011. As university income streams shift away from government due to the bankruptcy of the government, universities has no other means to look to earn income from outside of simple one‑way government funding, working with new partners to diversify the money they use to underpin research is another problem facing HEIs because most of International NGOs are only dealing either primary or secondary school education neglecting the higher education. The HEIs have failed to share any updates on research and innovations. In future provision of funds through NCHE to be competed for by researchers to eradicate the problem (Ustaz John 2019).

Academic Productivity and the Development of a Strong University in World wide’s ranking list;No any of South Sudanese universities has ever appeared either at regional or world’s university ranking, it due to poor admission of students this also includes initiating graduate programs particularly training of PhD students. A PhD is considered to be research training and should be one of the valued preconditions to be considered for employment by a university in the 21st century. When a PhD holder eventually is promoted to a Professor, he/she is expected to provide academic leadership in designing teaching programs, research, publication and dissemination of knowledge. For PhD supervision, professors should be grounded in research methodology in which both qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection and analysis are encouraged. PhD students who integrate both methodologies are likely to produce better analysis of the identified research (Kuyok, 2017). The World University Ranking said that, “if you want to study in South Sudan, then you need to know which of its universities are right for you. South Sudan does not currently have any universities in the overall Times Higher Education World University Rankings. However, if we have data about any institutions in the country, then they will appear on the map and choosing where to study in South Sudan is one of the biggest decisions you will ever make.”

Increase of higher education’s demand is also a main challenge. The rapid student growth is a major challenge to higher education managers such the Minister for Higher Education especially in the five public universities, in which my colleague Hon. Denay Jock Chagor will sooner or later face. The unsuitableness between student expansion and facilities is a typical of higher education institutions in South Sudan. This has caused into congested lecturing rooms and inadequacy in the learning spaces and sleeping accommodations particular students from different states for instance in Dr. John Garang MUST some lecturing halls are congested during lecturing hours to the extent that some students have to stand during lectures or some lecturers prefer to take students outside and lecture them under the tress and good enough Dr. JG-MUST is blessed with big very land and many trees. This is because to the few and limited facilities in terms of housings and chairs used in lecturing rooms henceforth a challenge upsetting Higher Education Institutions.

Physical Infrastructure 

The overall physical infrastructure for HEIs are few compare to the number of students enrolled, this still outmatched the available infrastructure. The physical infrastructure collectively refers to the facilities for both students and staff such as lecture rooms, libraries, and laboratories, working space for academic staff, recreation facilities, administration office space and accommodation for students feeding and health, leaving them to market forces and private provision so as to concentrate on core academic activities.

a). Lecture space; The overall picture shows that the total space available for learning very few compare to the currents number of students enrolled and lead into crowding and congestions of lecturing hall, sometimes it forced lecturers to prefer under tree lectures that can accommodation many students. Some institutions have maximized the use of available lecture space by having day and evening program activities.

b). Library space; All the five public universities have inadequate libraries together with staff and associated facilities, is crucial for higher education delivery. The new trend embraces use of e-resources to supplement physical libraries. However, given that HEIs still have limited access to ICT facilities, both options should therefore be used to supplement each other.

c). Laboratory space and computer usage; the government believes in STEM development, but there is no improvements have been done especially in government institutions. In public HEIs, no more attention has been given to ICT laboratories ignoring laboratories for basic sciences yet these are equally inadequate. The private institutions tend to avoid physical sciences program mainly because of heavy capital investment required and resort to ICT. I urge that all stakeholders to partner with government and HEIs to design and develop a sustainable incentive to support science education. This initiative may encourage public institutions to promote science programs and to develop laboratories and workshops in these institutions problems problem.

d). Office space;There is inadequate office space in all the universities. Office space refers to space occupied for administrative purpose such as space for departmental heads, staffrooms as well as areas for students to consult with staff on academic issues. The statistics show that HEIs do not have adequate space for academic staff, administrators and students’ guilds. In a number of institutions, including universities, sharing an office between four to ten members of staff has become the custom. In extreme cases, academic staff operates in common rooms with no space for private study and student consultation. I suggested that the government should do something about office space for the HEIs.

e). Halls of residence and student welfare; There are no residences and students welfares, but the modern approach to higher education is for institutions to divest from student welfare activities such as accommodation, feeding and health, leaving them to market forces and private provision so as to concentrate on core academic activities. It is however not possible to pull out completely from issues of students’ welfare for the following key reasons;

1. First, students with disabilities deserve special provision that private providers may not be able or willing to offer.
2. Secondly, institutions located in rural areas, where private accommodation and facilities may not be easily available, are duty bound to give students welfare facilities.
3. Thirdly, even where private sector student welfare is readily available, the institutions have a duty to oversee that the facilities are conducive to a proper learning environment.

The general observation is that the available student accommodation in many public and private universities and colleges falls short of expectations. Hostels tend to be crowded, located in environments non-conducive for learners and often lack security controls. Poor accommodation can lead to serious disciplinary problems, disrupting teaching and learning activities, destroying and causing health problems for students, including mental breakdowns. It therefore remains a duty of the HEIs to ensure that the hostels students stay in meet the standards for student study. This type of accommodations available at the universities was witnessed last year by the Chairman of Dr. John Garang University’s Council; Hon. Kuol Manyang Juuk went into boys’ and girls’ hostels at Dr. John Garang University and he had felt it bad and said during the interview with Fixing South Sudan with Mading Ngor Akech, you can get this on Youtube.

These are some of the problems and challenges that the new Hon. Minister of Higher Education be aware of. I personally strongly recommend that Comrade Hon. Denay Jock Chagor should first make his political to three public universities outside Juba such as University of Bhar Al Ghazal, Rumbek University of Science and Technology and then Dr. John Garang Memorial University of Science and Technology in Bor and he should come and Upper University and then he should end his tour at Juba University whereby experienced Prof. John Akec and Prof Robert will lecture to him more about the problems that currently facing HEIs in the Republic of South Sudan by doing this he will get more information than these in my article. In fact, the Hon. Minister for Higher Education and the Hon. Minister for Health have very task to do compare to other Ministers in the Republic of South Sudan, for the Minister of Health have to set the preventive measures against Corona Virus such as producing many masks, building a quarantine hospital, diagnosing machines, stocking Corona drugs, supplying food, purchasing doctors gowns and others equipment for fight Corona like what China did. China built a Hospital accommodates 1,000 Corona patients within 7 days a single week because the lives of South Sudanese are on the hand of the Minister of Health, not the president. Therefore, these two ministers should double their efforts compare to other thirty ministers in the country.

Conclusion:

To conclude, the Hon Minister for Higher Education, Sciences, Technology and Research should look at his position as a task oriented position rather than being political awarded position and I hope from his West backgrounds and experiences he has, I believe he will do a lot. The MoHEST should also allocate some enough money to the HE sector according to data and all these should be commuted in term of dollars or South Sudanese pounds. Therefore, prior preparation and proper planning, for budgeting should be done by the Ministries of Finances and Educations at national level in order to have a standardized system of education in the country. Education is a vital resource for any country and it is also valuable in distribution of morals and ethics that transform a wartime society into one with a culture of peace and our country need such transformation and reforms. Education is very vital for every person whether male or female. Education has a lot of benefits right away from political, social, economic, spiritual and physical dimensions; therefore, South Sudan should adopt it as priority number one (John Garang, Feb 25^th, 2020). Therefore, South Sudan needs great reforms in the planning and budgeting in the Ministries of Finance and Education by putting more money in this sector, this will make the great difference because education is a debt that the present generations owe to future generations and education is a key factor toward the national development.

The author, Ustaz John Garang Ayii Riak, is an Assistant Lecturer, Dr. John Garang Memorial University of Science and Technology, Jonglei State, Bor Town. He holds Bachelor of Arts with Education from Bugema University, Kampala Uganda and Masters’ Degree Student for Comparative Education Program at Zhejiang Normal University, Zhejiang Province, East China. He can be reached through his email: johngayii2014@gmail.com

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