Doctoral Education in South Africa

Johann Mouton, Nico Cloete

Description

Worldwide, in Africa and in South Africa, the importance of the doctorate has increased disproportionately in relation to its share of the overall graduate output over the past decade. This heightened attention has not only been concerned with the traditional role of the PhD, namely the provision of future academics; rather, it has focused on the increasingly important role that higher education - and, particularly, high-level skills - is perceived to play in national development and the knowledge economy.
This book is unique in the area of research into doctoral studies because it draws on a large number of studies conducted by the Centre of Higher Education Trust (CHET) and the Centre for Research on Evaluation, Science and Technology (CREST), as well as on studies from the rest of Africa and the world. In addition to the historical studies, new quantitative and qualitative research was undertaken to produce the evidence base for the analyses presented in the book.
The findings presented in Doctoral Education in South Africa pose anew at least six tough policy questions that the country has struggled with since 1994, and continues to struggle with, if it wishes to gear up the system to meet the target of 5 000 new doctorates a year by 2030. Discourses framed around the single imperatives of growth, efficiency, transformation or quality will not, however, generate the kind of policy discourses required to resolve these tough policy questions effectively. What is needed is a change in approach that accommodates multiple imperatives and allows for these to be addressed simultaneously.

Sujets

• Education

Informations

• Publié par: African Minds
• Date de parution: 08 décembre 2015
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781928331216
• Langue: English

Extrait

First published in 2015 by African Minds
African Minds
4 Eccleston Place, Somerset West, 7130, Cape Town, South Africa
[e-mail]
www.africanminds.org.za
2015 Nico Cloete, Johann Mouton and Charles Sheppard
All contents of this document, unless specified otherwise, are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
ISBNs
978-1-928331-00-1 Print
978-1-928331-07-0 e-Book
Produced by COMPRESS.dsl | www.compressdsl.com
Contents
List of figures and tables
Preface
About the authors
List of frequently used acronyms
Chapter 1
The demand for a doctorate: Global, African and South African contexts
Chapter 2
The demand to increase doctorates
Chapter 3
The demand for improved efficiency
Chapter 4
The demand for transformation
Chapter 5
Improve the quality of doctoral education
Chapter 6
Multiple paths to success
Chapter 7
Incremental change and a paradigm shift
Chapter 8
Policy choices and implications
Appendices
Appendix 1   Data sources and methodology
Appendix 2   Responses to the presentation of preliminary findings from the Study on the Doctorate in South Africa (May 2014)
Appendix 3   Current trends in PhD studies: A review of articles published on the University World News website (2013)
Appendix 4   Government steering of doctoral production
Appendix 5   Additional data on the doctorate in South Africa
Appendix 6   Scenarios that will produce doctoral graduates by 2030
References
List of figures and tables
Chapter 1
Figure 1.1 The rise of the doctorate: Percentage growth in doctoral output (1998–2006)
Figure 1.2 Doctoral enrolments at eight sub-Saharan African universities (2001, 2007, 2011)
Figure 1.3 Doctoral graduates at eight sub-Saharan African universities (2001, 2007, 2011)
Figure 1.4 Masters graduates at eight sub-Saharan African universities (2001, 2007, 2011)
Figure 1.5 Discourses on doctorate production in South Africa
Chapter 2
Figure 2.1 Growth in PhD graduates in South Africa (1920–2012)
Figure 2.2 Average annual growth rate of PhD graduates (1920–2012)
Figure 2.3 Masters and doctoral headcount enrolments (1996–2012)
Figure 2.4 Student enrolments (1996 and 2012)
Figure 2.5 Average shares of the doctoral enrolments in the various fields of study (1996–2012)
Figure 2.6 The distribution of doctoral enrolments by institution type (1996–2012)
Figure 2.7 Distribution of doctoral enrolments across major fields of study and institution categories (1996 compared to 2012)
Figure 2.8 Average shares of the doctoral graduates in the various fields of study (1996–2012)
Figure 2.9 Percentage distribution of doctoral graduates per institution type and field of study with SET subdivided further (2012)
Table 2.1 PhD enrolments per institutional type (1996–2012)
Table 2.2 ‘Top 5’ factors influencing students’ choice of their current degree programmes
Table 2.3 Total number of doctoral graduates per institution (2012)
Table 2.4 Distribution of doctoral graduates per institutional type and field of study (1996–2012)
Table 2.5 Comparison of PhD production in South Africa with a number of selected OECD countries (2000 and 2011)
Chapter 3
Figure 3.1 Comparison of doctoral enrolments and graduates (1996–2012)
Figure 3.2 Percentages of new doctoral intakes who graduated after five and six years respectively (2003–2007)
Figure 3.3 Progress of 2006 intake of new doctoral students after seven years by bands of performance
Figure 3.4 Progress of 2006 intake of new doctoral students after seven years by fields of study
Figure 3.5 Dropout and completion rates of the 2006 new entering doctoral cohort
Figure 3.6 Progress of 2006 intake of new doctoral students at universities after seven years
Figure 3.7 Progress of 2006 intake of new doctoral students at comprehensive universities after seven years
Figure 3.8 Progress of 2006 intake of new doctoral students at universities of technology after seven years
Table 3.1 Number of PhDs and staff with doctorates by university (2011–2013)
Chapter 4
Figure 4.1 Doctoral enrolments by race (1996–2012)
Figure 4.2 Percentage of doctoral enrolments by race (1996–2012)
Figure 4.3 Doctoral graduates by race (1996–2012)
Figure 4.4 Percentage of doctoral graduates by race (1996–2012)
Figure 4.5 Percentage of doctoral enrolments by gender (1996–2012)
Figure 4.6 Graduates by gender (1996–2012)
Figure 4.7 PhD enrolments by nationality: Foreign vs South African (2000–2012)
Figure 4.8 PhD enrolments by nationality: Rest of Africa, international and South African (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012)
Figure 4.9 Disaggregation of doctoral enrolments by nationality (2012)
Figure 4.10 Proportion of PhD graduates by nationality: Foreign vs South African (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012)
Figure 4.11 PhD graduates by nationality (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012)
Figure 4.12 Average annual growth rates by nationality and gender (2000–2012)
Figure 4.13 Doctoral graduates by nationality (2012)
Figure 4.14 South African doctoral graduates by race (2012)
Figure 4.15 African doctoral enrolments by nationality and gender (2000 and 2012)
Figure 4.16 African doctoral graduates by nationality and gender (2000 and 2012)
Table 4.1 Doctoral graduates by race and gender (1971–1979)
Table 4.2 Doctoral graduates by race and gender (1986–1995)
Table 4.3 African doctoral enrolments and graduates from South Africa and the rest of Africa by gender (2000–2012)
Table 4.4 African and white doctoral graduates 1996 and 2012 compared to 30-to-49-year-old age cohort
Chapter 5
Figure 5.1 Responses on supervisor guidance (2000)
Figure 5.2 Selection methods of PhD students supervised, by scientific field (2000)
Figure 5.3 Perceived importance of specified criteria for the selection of PhD students (2000)
Figure 5.4 Percentage of academic staff with doctorates (1996–2012)
Figure 5.5 Extent of agreement with statement ‘I sometimes have to supervise PhD work that lies outside my area of expertise’, by scientific field (2011)
Figure 5.6 Extent of agreement with statement ‘I lack sufficient time to give each PhD student the attention that he/she deserves’, by scientific field (2011)
Figure 5.7 Assessment of the quality of supervision by students (% rated as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’) (2000)
Figure 5.8 How doctoral studies prepared students for the world of work (2009)
Table 5.1 Academic staff with doctoral degrees and ratios of academic staff to doctoral students and graduates (1996–2012)
Table 5.2 Academic staff with doctoral degrees and ratios of academic staff to doctoral graduates by institutional type (2012)
Chapter 6
Table 6.1 Departments selected to explore the quantitative report on the HEMIS data
Chapter 8
Figure 8.1 2030 scenarios: Current (2%) average annual growth rate in student enrolments
Figure 8.2 2030 scenarios: High (4%) average annual growth rate in academic capacity
Table 8.1 Indicators for performance in doctoral production (2012)
Appendix 5
Table A1 PhD enrolments per institution type and broad field of study (1996 and 2012)
Table A2 PhD graduates per institutional type and broad field of study (1996 and 2012)
Table A3 PhDs by race and gender (1996–2012)
Table A4 Countries of origin of the 2012 international graduates
Preface
This book draws on a large number of studies conducted by the Centre for Higher Education Trust (CHET) and the Centre for Research on Evaluation, Science and Technology (CREST) over the past decade. In addition to these historical studies, primary research was also undertaken specifically to produce the evidence base for the statistical data referred to in the book. The historical studies focused on a range of issues that affect the growth, efficiency, quality and transformation of the doctorate in South Africa, doctoral supervision, and doctoral tracer studies as well as drawing on studies from the rest of Africa and the world.
Although CREST’s first study on postgraduate studies dates back to 2001 when it did a case study of doctoral graduates at Stellenbosch University, its first major investigation into the state of the doctorate in South Africa began in 2008 when it was commissioned by the Academy of Science of South Africa to conduct five studies on the doctorate: (1) a study on systemic blockages in postgraduate education and training; (2) a statistical profile of doctoral students in South Africa; (3) an employer study; (4) a study on doctoral attrition; and (5) a destination study of doctoral students. These five studies would eventually be integrated into a consensus report (‘The PhD: An evidence-based study on how to meet the demands for high-level skills in an emerging economy’) which was published in 2010 ( ASSAf 2010). The CREST reports were the result of a team effort of CREST staff but special mention should be made of the inputs of Nelius Boshoff, Lynn Lorenzen and Rein Treptow.
At about the same time, a series of dialogue sessions and roundtable discussions wer