The Quest for Refugee Higher Education in Ethiopia: The Case of Self-financing Eritreans

The definitive,peer reviewed and edited version of this article is published in Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning Volume 21, Number 2, May 2019, pp. 120-140. https://doi.org/10.5456/WPLL.21.2.120This study examines the challenges of Eritrean refugees attending their tertiary education in selected private medical colleges in Ethiopia, and the support schemes available to help them cope with their problems. The research involves a sample of 40 randomly selected refugee students and uses focus group discussion and interview as principal methods of data collection. The findings reveal that Eritrean refugee students in Ethiopia face a variety of challenges identified as academic, linguistic, emotional/psychological and sociocultural. Although there are some forms of support offered at governmental level, the institutional level of support is found to be deficient in many respects. Hence, further improvements in facilitating refugee higher education in Ethiopia are posited

The Notion of Relevance in Academic Collaboration

This article examines the notion of relevance in academic collaboration between North and South partners. It traces the history and nature of academic cooperation, and the major factors that determine the success of partnerships. It is argued that equitable, collaborative agenda setting, clear decision-making procedures, and consideration of the developmental goals that are the envisaged outcome of collaboration schemes are mechanisms that can be used to address issues of relevance. Failure to address relevance concerns could result in academics or institutions being diverted from addressing local or national priority areas. In turn, this could result in the relevance of the cooperation itself being questioned

Private Higher Education in Africa: Old Realities and Emerging Trends

The growth of private higher education in Africa has been driven by factors such as burgeoning demand that could not be met by the public sector and policy influences as Structural Adjustment Programmes that promoted privatisation in the 1980s and beyond. In the past three decades, the continent’s private higher education institutions have exhibited different growth trajectories. Variations are also evident in their policies and the quality of their offerings. However, the variation and incremental growth of this sector is not adequately captured in the extant literature. This article investigates Africa’s private higher education sector based on past and emerging realities and argues that the sector exhibits nuances that have not received sufcient attention due to excessive stereotyping of PHE in Africa and elsewhere. Understanding these differences, which are sometimes described as ‘exceptions’, is a prerequisite for developing a comprehensive conceptualisation of current tapestries and future trends. The article begins by examining the major features of global private higher education and proceeds to Africa with its major focus on emerging trends within the continent. Des facteurs comme la demande croissante qui ne pouvait être absorbée par le secteur public et les influences politiques des Programmes d’Ajustement Structurel qui ont promu la privatisation pendant les années 80 et après sont à l’origine de la croissance de l’enseignement supérieur privé en Afrique. Pendant les trois dernières décennies, les institutions privées d’enseignement supérieur ont présenté différentes trajectoires de croissance. Des différences sont aussi observables quant à leurs politiques et à la qualité de leur offre. Cependant, la variété et la croissance progressive de ce secteur ne sont pas correctement reflétées dans la littérature existante. Cet article examine le secteur de l’enseignement supérieur privé en Afrique à partir de réalités anciennes et nouvelles et soutient que les nuances de ce secteur n’ont pas reçu une attention sufsante à cause des stéréotypes excessifs auxquels fait face l’enseignement supérieur privé en Afrique et ailleurs. Comprendre ces différences, qui sont parfois catégorisées comme des exceptions, est un prérequis pour pouvoir conceptualiser de manière compréhensive le contexte actuel et les tendances futures. Cet article commence par analyser les caractéristiques principales de l’enseignement privé mondial avant de se focaliser sur l’Afrique avec une attention toute particulière pour les tendances émergentes sur le continent

Ethiopia

With the development of its internationalization policy in 2020, Ethiopia has joined the list of a number of African countries that have such a policy. Aimed at comprehensive internationalization, the document’s goals and components manifest conscious efforts to infuse local perspectives and dimensions in the policy. Implementation will require more effort in terms of addressing past deficiencies, emerging challenges, and the ambitious components of the new policy.   &nbsp

The Challenges of Attracting and Retaining International Faculty

In spite of the potential benefits of hiring expats in addressing the deficiencies of higher education systems in developing countries, attracting, recruiting, and retaining international faculty continues to be a challenging task

Family-Owned Private Higher Education Institutions in Africa

Notwithstanding the dearth of research on the subject, the increasing global presence of family-owned institutions is introducing a special breed within the private higher education sector. This article broadly explores the nature, continental developments, and implications of this growing phenomenon across Africa

Disparities and Parallels in Internationalization: The Ethiopian Experience

This article examines the ways in which internationalization is expressed in developed and developing countries. Specifically, we discuss factors such as motives, approaches, policies, strategies, and the nature of institutional relationships in the Ethiopian context

Unusual in Growth and Composition: Ethiopian Private Higher Education

Ethiopia’s private higher education (PHE) sector is the largest or second largest in sub-Saharan Africa, however a mix of enabling and restrictive policies have let PHE play a limited role in key respects. This article surveys the current landscape and asks important questions regarding the future of PHE

Student Mobility and Employability: The Ethiopian Experience

This article reports the findings of a larger study conducted on international students from Ethiopia to gauge their views on the impact of their training on employability. For those who can afford or have the chance, international studies are perceived as mechanisms of improving one’s employability due to the various advantages they can offer. This has become one of the major pull factors in student mobility