The ascendency of private parallelism to the state sphere of influence is dangerous for our unequal society
Last month I met three comrades who are long time acquaintances in Midrand, two of whom have children who were part of the matric class of 2016. I was shocked to learn that whilst their children had been accepted into two public universities for enrolment in 2017, as parents they had decided to rather send them to private higher education institutions.
Their rationale for this option relates to what they called the “chaos” in our universities following the advent of #FeesMustFall. They expressed fear that declining standards of quality in our higher education institutions was unavoidable should it be made free, as government will not be able to sustain injecting the ever increasing and inflationary linked resources beyond the current inadequate state subsidies.
I am told that this perception in the middle class and the rich, has traction. The long term implications of this is the rising of private universities and colleges from Europe opening their campuses here to offer alternative “quality” education against what would be a discredited “public” higher education.
Already, Mancosa, Regent and many private Colleges are now popular. For me, this is the most dangerous development and as a country we need to defend public higher education as a dominant feature. The labour market must continue to have trust in its graduates for hiring.
It would be a sad day when we reach a point where public higher education is seen by the markets and society as for those who are too poor to go to private higher education institutions and therefore are unattractive hires.