Former Education Minister Geoffrey Lungwangwa has observed that having a state policy on higher education will direct the development of colleges and universities in the country.
Professor Lungwangwa said backyard universities and colleges will continue mushrooming as long as the country remains without a policy on higher education.
He said not having a policy on tertiary education is hampering the development of higher education in the country.
He explained that universities world over are not built overnight but that they earn the status of university over a long period of time after existing as colleges.
He said the lack of state policy on tertiary education has led to people waking up and forming universities and colleges in their backyards.
Professor Lungwangwa is however hopeful that government will soon put in the law to direct the development of higher education because he was aware that by the time the former ruling party, the MMD, left office the policy was being drafted.
And Professor Lungwangwa has also observed that the country has not transformed the education curriculum to make it more relevant to the national development needs.
He underscored the importance of revisiting the curriculum so as to make education more relevant saying education curriculum should be in tune with the current needs of the country.
“We need to reform our curriculum so as to orient the education system at levels of our needs as a nation because the current system was flamed along Western education making it less likely to address our challenges,” Pro Lungwangwa said.
Useless PF – You are the ones that have led to the mushrooming of Universities – Building one in every village!!
Why didn’t you advise your “Dear Leader”, when he was building all those universities – kwena ba Lungwangwa, muli chinangwa!!
Like they’ll listen. Pupils are forced to learn local language in every subject in primary & making it compulsory & you get to wonder why students are not fluent in English or have bad reading culture.
I AM SHOCKED! ZAMBIA HAS NO POLICY ON HIGHER EDUCATION? NO WONDER WE HAVE HAD ONLY 2 UNIVERSITIES FOR 50 YEARS. IF YOU ARE A MINISTRY OF HIGH EDUCATION AND YOU ARE NOT DEVELOPING NEW UNIVERSITIES AND COLLEGES THEN IT DEFEATS THE POINT OF HAVING SUCH A MINISTRY. BESIDES, STUDENT LOANS HAVE BEEN DRUMMED INTO GOVT HEAD BY ALL AND SUNDRY, BUT IT SEEMS WORDS FALL ON A ROCK. WITH STUDENT LOANS ALL THESE STUDENT STRIKES WOULDN’T BE THERE KNOWING THAT AT THE END OF THE DAY A STUDENT HAS TO PAY BACK THE LOAN. MOREOVER, MORE SCHOOL LEAVERS CAN HAVE AN OPPORTUNITY TO ATTEND UNIVERSITY.