The National Working Group (NWG) was established by the Minister of Education in April 2001 to advise on the restructuring of the institutional landscape of the higher education system, as outlined in the National Plan for Higher Education, which was released in March 2001.
The National Plan for Higher Education (NPHE) was the culmination of a wide-ranging policy process for the transformation of the higher education system, which started in the early 1990s. It provides a framework for implementing the policy proposals contained in Education White Paper 3: A Programme for the Transformation of Higher Education, which was released in July 1997.
The White Paper’s central proposition is the creation of a single national co-ordinated higher education system that is planned, governed and funded as a single system.
This is underpinned by two inter-related factors:
The structural inefficiencies, furthermore, have given rise to a range of systemic problems, which adversely impact on the effectiveness and efficiency of the higher education system. These problems, as the National Plan suggests, relate to the “overall quality and quantity of graduate and research outputs; management, leadership and governance failures; lack of representative staff profiles; institutional cultures that have not transcended the racial divides of the past; and the increased competition between institutions which threaten to fragment further the higher education system” (NPHE, p. 6).
The White Paper argues that the goal of a single national system requires an assessment of the optimal number and type of institutions needed to ensure a higher education system which is, on the one hand, affordable and sustainable and, on the other, able to contribute effectively to social and economic development.
The Council on Higher Education (CHE), in turn, in its report, Towards a New Higher Education Landscape: Meeting the Equity, Quality and Social Development Imperatives of South Africa in the 21st Century (June 2000), argued firstly, that a differentiated and diverse higher education system is necessary to achieve the transformation goals of the White Paper; and, secondly, that institutional restructuring could take a number of forms, including greater programme collaboration between institutions within regions, as well as the merger of institutions.
The National Plan for Higher Education supports the need for a differentiated and diverse higher education system based on mission and programme differentiation linked to the type and range of qualifications offered, instead of differentiation linked to various institutional types, as proposed by the CHE.
The National Plan also supports the CHE's view that institutional restructuring could take different forms, including:
The National Plan indicated that an analysis of the available data suggested that the number of institutions could be reduced. The key issue was to determine the extent and form of such a reduction (NPHE, p. 3).
The establishment of the National Working Group and its Terms of Reference must be understood against the background of these policy developments. The Terms of Reference (cf. Appendix 1) specify that the NWG must advise on appropriate arrangements for consolidating the provision of higher education on a regional basis through establishing new institutional and organisational forms, including reducing the number of higher education institutions.
The Terms of Reference of the National Working Group specify that its investigation must be guided by the principles and goals for the transformation of the higher education system as outlined in the White Paper. These are:
The NWG developed a working paper to identify the key elements of the principles that should frame its work and shape its recommendations. It took as its point of departure the emphasis in the National Plan on the need to ensure that the higher education system produces high quality graduates with the appropriate skills and competencies, as well as the knowledge and research required to contribute to social and economic development. In short, in line with the National Plan, the NWG focused on the need to ensure the “fitness for purpose” of the higher education system, i.e. the extent to which the elements constituting the structures and operations of the system are suited and well-equipped to fulfil effectively those functions which are its raison d’être, thus enhancing the quality of the higher education system.
The NWG identified three main properties flowing from the principles, which it believes are critical to ensuring the “fitness for purpose” of the higher education system. These are equity, sustainability and productivity. A restructured higher education system should be socially just and equitable in its distribution of resources and opportunities, it should meet the requirements of long-term sustainability and it should enhance the productivity of the system through effectively and efficiently meeting the teaching, skills development and research needs of the country. The NWG’s understanding of equity, sustainability and productivity is outlined in the working paper on guiding principles in Appendix 2.
The NWG developed a set of performance indicators and linked benchmarks to enable it to assess the current state of the higher education system in the light of the properties flowing from the guiding principles. The indicators and benchmarks, which are described in Appendix 3, provide a framework for assessing quantitatively the equity, sustainability and productivity properties that in the NWG’s view should characterise healthy and well-functioning higher education institutions. It should be noted, however, that where appropriate, the benchmarks were adjusted to take into account the historical differences between technikons and universities.
The NWG recognises that the indicators and benchmarks do not reflect properties, such as leadership, management, governance and academic standards, which can only be assessed through qualitative judgments and peer review. The NWG also recognises that the methodology used to derive some of the indicators, such as graduation rates, is open to discussion. This is largely due to the limited availability of appropriate data because of shortcomings in the old SAPSE management information system. However, despite these concerns, the NWG is convinced that the indicators provide a useful framework with which to identify some of the strengths and weaknesses of the higher education system in general and individual institutions in particular.
The indicators and benchmarks were translated into “radar charts” or “spidergrams” in order to facilitate comparison both between institutions within the university and technikon sectors, as well as between the two sectors.
The spidergram for universities which appears on the next page shows that the university sector satisfies on average only 4 of the 12 benchmarks, namely, student equity, enrolment stability, enrolment size and staff availability. The university sector does not meet any of the output benchmarks, and on average its financial stability and staff equity profile is below the benchmark
. The spidergram for technikons, which also appears on the next page, is similar to that of the universities. However, reflecting historical imbalances in some cases, it indicates that the technikon sector is weaker than the university sector in relation to the output benchmarks.
The National Working Group undertook its investigations and arrived at its recommendations through: