February 21, 2023
South Africa: Is Psychological Grit Over-Rated As the Key to Retention in Distance Education?
Psychological grit has garnered a lot of interest in the last decade, particularly in the higher education arena. It's typically defined as passion and perseverance for long-term… Read more »
February 19, 2023
Africa: We Pitted ChatGPT Against Tools for Detecting AI-Written Text, and the Results Are Troubling
As the "chatbot wars" rage in Silicon Valley, the growing proliferation of artificial intelligence (AI) tools specifically designed to generate human-like text has left many… Read more »
February 10, 2023
Tanzania: Tanzania Has Ditched School Rankings. It Should Replace Them With Something More Useful
While announcing the results of the 2022 Certificate of Secondary School Examination, Tanzania's National Examination Council did not provide school rankings for the first time in… Read more »
February 06, 2023
Africa: I Introduced Social Entrepreneurship to My Trainee Teachers - Why It'll Make Them Better At Their Jobs
The daily headlines from South Africa are largely gloomy. The country's government seems unable to address a years-long electricity crisis that is steadily worsening. Unemployment… Read more »
February 01, 2023
Kenya: George Magoha Was a Force for Better Education in Kenya. but He Had His Flaws
The death of former Kenyan education minister Professor George Magoha, 71, closes a vibrant chapter in education policymaking and leadership. It was a chapter marked by unmatched… Read more »
January 31, 2023
South Africa: South Africa's Dysfunctional Universities - the Consequences of Corrupt Decisions
What happens when those responsible for managing universities cannot trust each other to act with integrity? In a nutshell, as I discuss in my new book, Corrupted: A study of… Read more »
January 30, 2023
Africa: Children Lost One-Third of a Year's Learning to Covid, New Study Shows - but We Need to Think About the Problem Differently
Children's learning progress has slowed substantially during the pandemic, roughly equating to a loss of around 35% of the typical learning in a school year, according to a new… Read more »
January 25, 2023
Africa: Free Online Courses Could Be a Path to Higher Education in African Countries but Awareness Is Low
Sub-Saharan Africa is one of the largest regions in the world and has the lowest rates of participation in higher education anywhere in the world. The World Bank reported in 2020… Read more »
January 18, 2023
Kenya: School Reform Is Entering a New Phase in 2023 - but the Country Isn't Ready
The start of the 2023 school year in Kenya marks an important occasion: the first cohort of pupils to adopt a new curriculum in 2017 are entering junior secondary school. Read more »
January 17, 2023
Africa: Curious Kids - Is There Such a Thing As Nothing?
Is there such a thing as nothing? - Reggie, aged seven, Darlington Read more »
January 16, 2023
Nigeria: Nigeria's University System Needs Radical Reform
Amid strikes by Nigeria's Academic Staff Union of Universities, one thing is clear: the current funding model for the country's public universities is broken. The government's new… Read more »
November 29, 2022
Kenya: 6 Priorities to Get Kenya's Curriculum Back On Track - or Risk Excluding Many Children From Education
Kenya's education curriculum was reformed in 2017 to improve its quality - but now many Kenyans are calling for change again. Public disillusionment with the competency-based… Read more »
November 24, 2022
Kenya: Al-Shabaab - Sensational Media Reports About Terror Attacks Keep Kids Out of School
Sensational reporting on terror attacks in Kenya is keeping children out of school, with dire consequences for their education and their futures. Read more »
November 23, 2022
South Africa: Black Panther in the Classroom - How Afrofuturism in a Film Helped Trainee Teachers
Back in 2018 I joined the millions of people who flocked to cinemas worldwide to watch Ryan Coogler's Black Panther. The story of an ultra modern African society not shaped by… Read more »
November 21, 2022
Uganda: Ebola - Schools Were Closed for Two Years During Covid, Now They Face More Closures - Something Must Change
Children in Uganda missed out on more school because of the COVID pandemic than their peers anywhere else in the world. An estimated 15 million pupils in the East African nation… Read more »
Tanzania: Pregnant Students May Stay in School Says New Ruling By African Child Rights Experts
The African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of Children recently made what experts call a landmark ruling. The committee is a regional quasi-judicial organ of the… Read more »
November 18, 2022
South Africa: LGBTIQ+ Learners At Risk As Conservative Christian Groups Fight Plans for Safer Schools
Advocacy groups in South Africa are intensifying their efforts to prevent the country's education department from creating safer environments for children of diverse gender… Read more »
November 07, 2022
Africa: Why It's Wrong to Blame Online Learning for Causing Mental Health Issues During Covid-19
Post-secondary student mental health is in crisis: Research shows students' mental health was adversely affected in the pandemic, and this falls on the heels of pre-existing… Read more »
October 27, 2022
Nigeria: Nigeria's Education for Entrepreneurs Needs to Keep It Real, Not Just in the Classroom
Africa is home to over 200 million people aged between 15 and 24, according to UN data. The continent has the largest population of young people in the world. Read more »
October 23, 2022
South Africa: In 1986 Wits University Did a Survey About Its Relevance to South Africa - Another Is Needed
As the number of black students increased at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa in the 1980s, township struggles spread onto the campus and management came… Read more »
October 11, 2022
South Africa: Decolonising Education in South Africa - A Reflection On a Learning-Teaching Approach
It has been seven years since students in South Africa began protesting in a bid to "Africanise" the country's university curricula. They viewed what they were learning as too… Read more »
October 02, 2022
South Africa: 100 Years of Innovation and Inventions - South African Vice Chancellor Reflects On What's Next
We live in a world characterised by inequality, poverty, economic volatility, globalisation, climate change and ambiguity. In my own country, South Africa, residents have to… Read more »
September 30, 2022
South Africa: Universities Need to Better Support Doctoral Supervisors
South Africa's government has ambitious plans for doctoral education. The country aims to increase its output to 5,000 doctorates annually by 2030. In 2013, the figure stood at… Read more »
September 25, 2022
South Africa: Business Mentoring and Support - How Principals Can Improve Early Childhood Development Centres
Early childhood development centres, often referred to as crèches, day cares, edu-cares or preschools, are vital spaces for young children. There, they can learn and play,… Read more »
September 21, 2022
Nigeria: Nigeria's Universities Can Find Funds and Produce Job Creators - Here's How
Industrial action by Nigeria's university lecturers has entered its seventh month. The strike is one of the longest by academic staff in Africa's most populous country. Read more »