Tertiary education in Africa

非洲高等教育

詞匯

Tertiary education/高等教育，大學教育

A booming population is putting strain on Africa’s universities

人口激增給非洲的大學帶來了壓力

New initiatives can help to ease it

新方案可以幫助緩解這種情況

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Aug 10th 2019 | KIGALI

“IN RWANDA IT’S not easy to get a job,” says Jean-Paul Bahati, a student at Kepler, a college founded in Kigali in 2013. But the 22-year-old believes his course will help him stand out. He studies health-care management, a growing industry in Rwanda. Kepler’s degrees are accredited by Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), which runs one of the largest online universities in America. The first six months are a crash course in skills such as critical thinking, English, communication and IT. “I like that Kepler knows what employers want,” says Mr Bahati.

“在盧旺達，找工作并不容易，”開普勒大學(Kepler)的學生Jean-Paul Bahati這樣說道。開普勒大學于2013年在基加利成立。但22歲的他相信他的課程將幫助他脫穎而出。他學習醫(yī)療管理，這是盧旺達一個正在發(fā)展的行業(yè)。開普勒大學的學位由美國最大的網(wǎng)絡大學之一南新罕布什爾大學(SNHU)認證。頭六個月學習的內容是批判性思維、英語、溝通和IT等技能的速成班。Bahati表示:開普勒大學知道雇主想要什么，這也是我對學校喜愛的一點。”

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In recent decades millions of young people like Mr Bahati have swelled the number of students in sub-Saharan Africa. Today 8m are in tertiary education, a term that includes vocational colleges and universities. That is about 9% of young people—more than double the share in 2000 (4%), but far lower than in other regions (see chart). In South Asia the share is 25%, in Latin America and the Caribbean, 51%.

近幾十年來，數(shù)百萬像Bahati這樣的年輕人使撒哈拉以南非洲的學生人數(shù)激增。如今，有800萬人接受高等教育，其中包括職業(yè)學院和大學。這一比例約為9%，是2000年的兩倍多(4%)，但遠低于其他地區(qū)(見圖表)。在南亞，這一比例為25%，拉丁美洲和加勒比地區(qū)為51%。

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Both the number and share of young people in tertiary education in sub-Saharan Africa will keep growing. The region has about 90m people aged 20-24, a figure projected to double over the next 30 years. Whereas 42% of that age group had completed secondary school in 2012, 59% are forecast to do so by 2030. If African countries are to meet the aspirations of educated young people, they must ensure there are opportunities for further study.

非洲撒哈拉以南地區(qū)接受高等教育的年輕人數(shù)量和比例將持續(xù)增長。該地區(qū)約有9000萬20至24歲的人口，預計未來30年這一數(shù)字將翻一番。2012年這一年齡段中有42%的人完成了中學學業(yè)，而預計到2030年這一比例將達到59%。如果非洲國家要實現(xiàn)擁有知識青年的渴望，他們必須確保年輕人們有深造的機會。

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So far they have struggled. State-run institutions that trained the post-colonial elites are finding it hard to serve a mass market. In much of the region public funding per student has fallen since the late 1990s as enrolment has surged.

一直以來，他們一直在努力。致力于培養(yǎng)后殖民時代人才的國有機構發(fā)現(xiàn)很難服務于大眾市場。自上世紀90年代末以來，由于入學人數(shù)激增，該地區(qū)大部分地區(qū)的撥款在每一名學生上的公共資金有所下降。

詞匯

post-colonial/殖民地時期之后的

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This reflects competing priorities. In the poorest African countries it costs 27 times more to fund a university place than one at primary school. Since students typically come from affluent families, university spending subsidises the children of elites. In Ghana, the higher-education spending that goes to the richest tenth of households is 135 times that spent on the poorest tenth. Policymakers find themselves deciding whether to spend scarce resources on helping poor children attend school or rich children go to university.

這反映了相互競爭的優(yōu)先事項。在最貧窮的非洲國家，大學學費是小學學費的27倍。由于學生通常來自富裕家庭，大學支出補貼了精英家庭的孩子。在加納，最富有的十分之一家庭的高等教育支出是最貧窮的十分之一家庭的135倍。政策制定者發(fā)現(xiàn)，他們要決定是把稀缺資源用于幫助貧困兒童上學，還是讓富裕兒童上大學。

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The effects of spreading public funding thinly are apparent on campuses. African universities have 50% more students per professor than the global average. Students are more likely to study humanities degrees than science ones, which are more expensive to teach. Over 70% of graduates have arts degrees, versus 53% in Asia.

在大學校園里，稀缺的公共資金的影響是顯而易見的。非洲大學的每位教授要帶比全球平均水平多出50%的學生。學生更有可能攻讀人文學科學位，而不是理科學位，后者的教學成本更高。超過70%的畢業(yè)生擁有藝術學位，而亞洲的這一比例為53%。

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More young people are heading abroad instead. In 2017 some 374,000 studied overseas, up from 156,000 two decades earlier. Many never return. One in nine Africans with a tertiary qualification lives in an OECD country, compared with one in 13 Latin Americans and one in 30 Asians.

越來越多的年輕人選擇出國來代替國內教育。2017年，約有37.4萬人出國留學，高于20年前的15.6萬人。而他們中許多出去就再也不回來。九分之一擁有高等學歷的非洲人生活在經(jīng)合組織國家（主要為歐美和澳洲國家），而非洲人在拉美和亞洲的比例分別為十三分之一和三十分之一。

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With the public sector struggling to meet demand for places and to offer a high-quality education, the private sector is filling the gap. From 1990 to 2014 the number of public universities in sub-Saharan Africa rose from 100 to 500, while private universities grew from 30 to more than 1,000. Many are small. In Kigali, the University of Rwanda has 30,000 students, while private ones have a few hundred each. But they are enrolling a growing proportion of students, notes Daniel Levy of the University of Albany. In 2000 about 10% of African students went to private institutions; by 2015 the share was 20%. In Rwanda more than half do so.

由于公共部門難以滿足入學需求并提供高質量的教育，私立部門（大學）正在填補這一缺口。從1990年到2014年，撒哈拉以南非洲的公立大學從100所增加到500所，而私立大學從30所增加到1000多所。這其中（私立大學）大都是小規(guī)模的。在基加利，盧旺達大學有3萬名學生，而私立學校只有幾百名學生。但奧爾巴尼大學的丹尼爾?利維指出，他們招收的學生比例越來越高。2000年，大約10%的非洲學生進入私立學校;到2015年，這一比例達到了20%。在盧旺達，超過一半的學生選擇了私立學校。

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Students at private universities often benefit from new ways of teaching. Consider Ashesi, which has grown steadily since its founding in 2002 in Accra. Much of Ghanaian higher education is based on rote learning, observes Patrick Awuah, its founder and a former Microsoft engineer, and was not “teaching students to think critically”. He based Ashesi on American liberal-arts colleges, where students combine humanities and sciences.

私立大學的學生經(jīng)常受益于新的教學方法。以阿什西學院為例，該學校自2002年在阿克拉成立以來一直穩(wěn)步成長?！凹蛹{的大部分（學校的）高等教育都是死記硬背”，阿什西學院的創(chuàng)始人、前微軟工程師帕特里克?阿瓦(Patrick Awuah)評論道，加納的高等教育并沒有“教會學生批判性思維”。他將阿什西學院的教學建立在美國文理學院的基礎上，在文理學院的學生將人文和科學結合起來。

Vocational outfits can innovate, too. ALX, a for-profit institution that opened its first campus in Nairobi last year, runs a six-month “boot-camp” in soft skills, then helps students find a six-month internship. Its gambit is that its brand becomes so strong that employers do not mind that its graduates lack a degree.

職業(yè)機構也可以創(chuàng)新。ALX是一家營利性機構，去年在內羅畢開設了它的第一個校區(qū)。該機構在軟技能方面開展了為期6個月的“訓練營”，然后幫助學生找到為期6個月的實習機會。它的策略是，它的品牌變得如此強大，以至于雇主不介意它的畢業(yè)生沒有學位。

詞匯

Vocational/職業(yè)的，行業(yè)的

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“A traditional university model is very hard to make profitable,” says Fred Swaniker, the Ghanaian founder of ALX. He should know. In 2013 Mr Swaniker set up the African Leadership University (ALU), which was dubbed the “Harvard of Africa”. But its campuses in Mauritius ($15,000 per year for board and tuition) and Kigali ($9,000) are “too expensive”, he concedes. It has ditched plans to open dozens of campuses like these and is instead expanding the cheaper ($2,000 per year) ALX model.

“傳統(tǒng)的大學模式很難盈利，”ALX的加納創(chuàng)始人弗雷德?斯旺尼克(Fred Swaniker)表示。他應該知道。2013年，Swaniker先生建立了非洲領導大學(ALU)，被稱為“非洲的哈佛”。但他承認，該校在毛里求斯的校區(qū)(每年1.5萬美元的食宿和學費)和基加利的校區(qū)(每年9000美元學費)的學費“太貴了”。 非洲領導大學已經(jīng)放棄了像這樣開設幾十個分校的計劃，轉而擴大更便宜(每年2000美元)的ALX模式。

詞匯

Dub/刺；授予…稱號

Concede/讓步

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Another reason for the shift is regulation. Gaining accreditation is arduous. Rwanda made ALU buy 90 desktop computers, even though it gives students laptops. Kepler’s application ran to 1,100 pages.

這種轉變的另一個原因是監(jiān)管。獲得認證是困難的。盧旺達要求非洲領導大學購買90臺臺式電腦，盡管它給學生提供筆記本電腦。僅開普勒大學的資質認定就長達1100頁。

詞匯

Arduous/努力的；費力的

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Yet the biggest barrier to expanding access to tertiary education is student financing. This is true for private and public universities, since in most African countries public ones charge upfront tuition fees. (Scholarships exist, but these are often granted on merit, not need, putting them out of reach of poor children with good but not stellar grades.) “The bottleneck is not the education model; it’s the financing,” says Teppo Jouttenus of Kepler.

然而，擴大接受高等教育的最大障礙是學生資助。私立大學和公立大學都是如此，因為在大多數(shù)非洲國家，公立大學收取預付學費。(獎學金是存在的，但這些獎學金往往是憑成績而非需要發(fā)放的，讓成績優(yōu)秀但并非拔尖的貧困兒童無法獲得。)開普勒大學的Teppo Jouttenus說道：“擴大教育的瓶頸并非教育模式，而是資金問題。”

詞匯

Upfront/預付的

Stellar/主要的；一流的

Bottleneck/瓶頸；障礙物

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This is not just an injustice but a sign of economic inefficiency. The average gap between wages earned by graduates and non-graduates in sub-Saharan Africa is wider than in other regions. It would make sense if students could defer the expense. This would ensure that those who benefit the most from university cover the costs, leaving more public money for other things.

這不僅是一種不公平，也是經(jīng)濟效率低下的表現(xiàn)。撒哈拉以南非洲地區(qū)畢業(yè)生和非畢業(yè)生的平均工資差距比其他地區(qū)更大。如果學生可以推遲支付費用，這將帶來更高的收益。這將確保那些從大學中受益最多的人承擔費用，留下更多的公共資金用于其他事情。

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Several African countries have introduced state loan schemes. But governments have struggled to chase up debts. The private sector is now trying to do a better job. Kepler and Akilah, an all-female college in Kigali, are working with CHANCEN International, a German foundation, to try out a model of student financing popular among economists—Income Share Agreements. CHANCEN pays the upfront costs of a select group of students. Once they graduate, alumni pay CHANCEN a share of their monthly income, up to a maximum of 180% of the original loan. If they do not get a job, they pay nothing.

一些非洲國家已經(jīng)引進了國家貸款計劃。但各國政府一直在努力增加債務。私營部門現(xiàn)在正努力做得更好。開普勒大學和基加利的一所女子學院Akilah正與德國的一個基金會 “國際·機遇”合作，嘗試一種受經(jīng)濟學家歡迎的學生資助模式——收入分成協(xié)議?！皺C遇”基金會部分為選中的一部分學生預支學費。一旦他們畢業(yè)，畢業(yè)生將其月收入的一部分用于償還“機遇“基金會，一直到最初貸款額的180%為止。如果他們沒有找到工作，他們就不必付款。

詞匯

Alumni/（統(tǒng)稱）校友，畢業(yè)生

Kepler’s experiment began only in January. But models such as these should help more students gain qualifications, while encouraging institutions to think about their job prospects. That can only be good news for young Africans.

開普勒大學的實驗在一月份才開始。但這樣的模式應該有助于更多的學生獲得入學資格，同時鼓勵院校考慮他們的就業(yè)前景。這對非洲年輕人來說是百利而無一害的好消息。

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