A year of high expectations, yet little action.
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Gonski funding was scrapped and the vocational education sector got a new student loan system. Here’s what else happened in education this year…
REUTERS/Siphiwe Sibeko
2017 promises to be another tough year as South African universities head into the uncertain terrain of further addressing and healing the divisions that have been exposed.
Working class students are turning their backs on a university education.
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Working-class students are put off by a perceived future of low pay and high debt.
How do friendship networks work?
Book Lin
College is a time for friendships. But how can students best leverage the power of those friendships? First, by learning how those networks work.
Why learn a new language?
Timothy Vollmer
Language learning can make people more open to seeing a new way of doing things and develop a greater level of comfort with unfamiliar situations.
A flat-rate fee on student loans isn’t a radical idea.
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A flat-rate fee on all student loans is a fairer economic proposal.
The campus community can have different cyber priorities.
John Hogg / World Bank
Cyber threats are universal. But the appropriate response may be quite different in academia from what works in the corporate world.
Towards inclusion.
Daniel M Ernst
New guidelines from Scotland’s universities association are a major step in the right direction.
Students gather to participate in the #SanctuaryCampus protest in New York.
Bria Webb/Reuters
Twenty states not only accept undocumented students in higher education institutions, but also provide them with financial support.
University “transformation” has a unique meaning in South Africa.
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If researchers pose the right questions about transformation, this can lead to better answers, stronger policies and, ultimately, real change.
Governments must move away from seeing education solely as an economic benefit.
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Massive expansion of the education system has created new problems, and left old ones unresolved.
South Africa needs to forge new partnerships between government, business and civil society.
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A lot was expected from the South African finance minister’s 2016 medium term budget which came amid an unfolding economic crisis including the higher education funding gap.
A student passes South African riot police during free education protests at Johannesburg’s University of the Witwatersrand.
Reuters/Siphiwe Sibeko
Some students argue wrongly that the ANC has betrayed the promise of free higher education made in the Freedom Charter. The governing party’s populism is also to blame for the confusion.
Thousands of students marched to parliament where South Africa’s finance minister presented his mid-term budget.
EPA/Nic Bothma
Finance minister Pravin Gordhan announced that government expenditure on higher education and specifically universities will be the fastest growing expenditure items on the budget.
There isn’t enough robust data around what teaching style are effective in higher education.
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Research looking at evidence-based teaching in higher education tends to be based more on anecdotes than on large, robust and peer-reviewed data.
Pat Hutchens
Speculation has fallen on whether Labor will maintain its planned policy of enforcing a binding vote on marriage equality.
Academic Roz Ward was temporarily suspended from La Trobe University for her comments about the Australian flag on Facebook.
Richard Milnes/Newzulu
A new clause being embedded in a number of university contracts attempts to restrict academics from speaking freely in public debate about issues that are outside their area of research.
Mike Hutchings/Reuters
When several South African universities merged, it was hoped this would improve access and equality. It had the opposite effect.
Women are likely to be disproportionately affected by the new VET student loan scheme.
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Placing greater control over student fees will not lift the quality of student outcomes and ensure the integrity of the qualifications issued.
Is it time to do away with honorary titles?
Dan Himbrechts/AAP
The decision to award former Prime Minister John Howard an honorary doctorate was criticised. So what are honorary titles - and why do we still have them?