Accommodating rising student numbers in South Africa
Prof. Estelle Trengove
The schools which educate South Africa’s future electrical engineers are facing many challenges at present. These include remaining relevant in a rapidly changing world and ensuring that their programmes continue to meet the requirements of accrediting bodies and industry.
The greatest concern, however, is the massive increase in undergraduate student numbers.
Student numbers enrolled in the first-year Electric Circuits course at the the University of the Witwatersrand’s School of Electrical Engineering has more than doubled since 2006.
The increase in undergraduate student numbers, also referred to as the “massification of higher education”, is not unique to South Africa; it is a global trend showing evidence of the democratisation of higher education.
Scholarships, bursaries, the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) and government subsidies have contributed to making education accessible to a growing number of school leavers.
NSFAS started off as a government scheme granting loans to students who would otherwise not have been able to attend university. The “Fees must fall” protests of 2015 and 2016 ultimately resulted in the president at the time announcing that higher education for poor and working-class students would be free from 2018.
Poor students are defined as being from South African households with a combined annual income of up to R350 000. This was the final step in the democratisation of higher education in South Africa. To implement this promise, NSFAS funds are now given to poor and working-class students as bursaries and not as loans.
According to a survey conducted by the Academic Development Unit in the Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment (FEBE) at Wits University January 2018, 50% of first-year students in the Electric Circuits class are the first members of their families to attend university. This is seen as the result of more accessible higher education.
At Wits, however, growing student numbers put pressure on resources. It is becoming increasingly difficult to find venues to accommodate large first-year classes. The increase in marking and course administration means that academic staff have less time available for research. Clearly, the university cannot continue to teach in the same way as when classes were much smaller.
The important thing is not for lecturers to teach, but for students to learn. Literature on higher education shows a shift in thinking regarding learning and teaching from the transmission model, where teachers simply broadcast knowledge to students, towards a model where students actively engage in constructing their own knowledge and skills bases.
Traditional chalk-and-talk lectures no longer seem to be an efficient method of using face-to-face time with students in large classes. Lecturers must bring their teaching into the 21st century by adopting new approaches.
Tablets and apps allowing lecturers to capture voice and handwriting make it possible to create online material for students. Recent developments at Wits will take further strides toward modernising higher education. The university has just spent R500-million on an ICT upgrade as part of a strategy for rolling out blended and on-line teaching. Blended learning combines online and face-to-face teaching.
The Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment at Wits is addressing the challenge of large student numbers by providing as many routes as possible for students to succeed. Currently, all first-year electrical engineering courses are offered as part-time night classes through WitsPlus, making it possible for students to work and study part-time. It will eventually be possible to complete the first two years of a BSc Engineering degree part-time. Thereafter, it should be easier for successful students to obtain bursaries and scholarships to complete their third and fourth years as full-time students.
As of 2019, all first-year engineering students at Wits University will be enrolled for a common first year. This initiative will give students more options. Many students come into engineering without knowing what engineering is really about and they do not understand the differences between the different branches of engineering. A common first year will give them an opportunity to make more informed choices about their studies. Students in the common first year will do a Mathematics and Physics so that those who decide that engineering is not for them will be able to continue with a second year BSc.
Contact Prof. Estelle Trengove, University of the Witwatersrand, Tel 011 717-7230, estelle.trengove@wits.ac.za
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