INSTITUTIONAL VARIANCES IN ACCESS PATTERNS

The Minister of Native Affairs in 1953, Hendrik Verwoerd, stated:

There is no place for [the Bantu] in the European community above the level of certain forms of labour ... What is the use of teaching the Bantu child mathematics when it cannot use it in practice? (Christie, 1985:12).

The education legacy inherited by SA has been described in detail by various policy analysts (CHE, 2004b; Bunting, 1994; Cooper & Subotzky, 2001). Earlier chapters in this thesis have described the structural and systemic factors that delineated the sector by race. A complex governing system had been instituted, which meant that for higher education, universities were created in the TBVC states, in self-governing territories and under various racially defined government departments. Thus, falling under the House of Delegates (Indians) was the University of Durban-Westville and under the House of Representatives (Coloured) was the University of the Western Cape. Both of these institutions were designated for specific race groups, with governance responsibility shifting from the designated departments at various junctures (CHE, 2004b:22).

In terms of legislation, there were key Acts that provided the framework that ensured that access to education broadly, and higher education specifically, was skewed along racial lines. The Bantu Education Act 47 of 1953 (RSA, 1953) legalised apartheid as it made provision for education institutions to be separated at all levels based on race. The Act was catastrophic in terms of the impact as it created deeply entrenched patterns and structures of exclusion. This Act was followed by the Extension of University Education Act of 1959, which provided for African universities to be established and further entrenched racial divides in higher education. The objective of the Act was:

To provide for the establishment, maintenance, management and control of university colleges for non-white persons; for the admission of students to and their instruction at university colleges; for the limitation of the admission of non- white students to certain university institutions; and for other incidental matters (Act 45 of 1959:484).

It has been documented that the impact of this legislation, along with other concomitant legislation, would have a devastating impact on long-term social exclusion of Blacks from higher education (CHE, 2004b). Apart from the establishment of universities for African students, it was specifically targeted at the exclusion of Africans, Coloureds and Indians from any other universities unless permission was obtained from the Minister. The suite of legislation governing higher education in the period before 1994 had the following features, which have had far-reaching consequences for the higher education system as a whole and which continue to haunt and bedevil integration of the system:

1. Complex and different, but separate, governance arrangements for universities and technikons;

2. Different models of funding;

3. Admission policies based on racial classification;

4. In some universities, separate teaching and learning facilities.

Some of the consequences are described below:

The Afrikaans-medium universities – Potchefstroom, Pretoria, Orange Free State and (after Afrikaans had become an established language) Stellenbosch – had from their foundation restricted admission to whites. Of the English-medium universities, Rhodes was all-white and Fort Hare in practice non-white; the

remaining three, while more open, were by no means fully multi-racial. Natal admitted non-whites, but kept its classes racially segregated. Cape Town and Witwatersrand admitted students to courses without regard to race but applied a strict colour-bar in social and sporting events (Lapping, 1986:183).

Figure 5.3 provides the average annual growth rate for African student enrolment of a select group of universities between 1994 and 2010. NMMU, NWU, UFS, UJ and UKZN figures incorporate headcount enrolment figures from the merged institutions.

FIGURE 5.3: AVERAGE ANNUAL GROWTH RATE: 1994–2010 OF SELECTED UNIVERSITIES

Source: DHET, HEMIs, 2012.

It must be noted, as an example, that a university like the University of Potchefstroom (PUCHE)30 merged with a university like the University of Bophuthatswana (UNIBO) in 2004 to establish North-West University (NWU), which would account for the spike in growth given the racial profile of UNIBO. The 20 percent average annual growth for NWU is high, but can be accounted for by the merger. There has been criticism of NWU, with assertions that African students are diverted to the Mafekeng campus or to distance education programmes. Once again, the quantitative data does not probe these aspects.

If one looks at the University of Cape Town (UCT) and the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), the average annual growth is six and nine percent respectively. In terms of actual growth, UCT moved from 2940 African students in 1994 to 7052 in 2010. Wits University shifted far more significantly, actual headcount enrolment figures from 3975 in 1994 to 16 670 in 2010. Despite the significant annual growth rate for the University of Stellenbosch,

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it must be noted that the institution was operating from a low base of African enrolment: 222 students in 1994 and 3811 in 2010. As an overall percentage of enrolled students, African students represent 14 percent of the total enrolment headcount. The language policy of the university could be identified as a barrier to broadening access, as the majority of undergraduate programmes are presented in Afrikaans (www.sun.ac.za/language-at-sun). The University of the Free State (UFS), which incorporated the QwaQwa campus of the University of the North and the Vista Campus in Bloemfontein in 2004, offers a parallel medium policy with some teaching in Sesotho. The latter two institutions were mainly for African students and would contribute to the significant growth in numbers for the UFS, with an average annual growth rate of 20 percent. In actual headcount numbers, this represented an increase from 906 in 1994 to 18 407 in 2010. Rhodes University and Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) show similar growth patterns, with no visible spikes in growth for either institution. UJ has had a radical shift in headcount enrolment, with an average annual growth of ten percent. A result of the merger between Wits Technikon, Vista Daveyton and Soweto as well as Rand Afrikaans University, the African representation was at 74 percent of total enrolment in 2010, with a decline in the actual number of White students.

A respondent, interviewed for the purposes of this research, provided some insight into shifts in admissions policies at a former Afrikaans university. He stated that the Council of the university had calculated that growth would be impossible if the pool of students was limited to White Afrikaans speaking students. This informed institutional admission policy changes, which opened the doors for other races to be admitted31.

The purpose of the vignettes provided above is to analyse growth in specific universities measured between 1994 and 2010. The analysis demonstrates uneven patterns of growth for African students enrolled at each university. The growth is linked to institutional histories and in some cases, language policies. The impact of the mergers on leapfrogging growth in specific institutions has also been discussed. A phenomenon that did occur as documented in the NPHE (DoE, 2001), was the flight from historically Black universities to historically White universities. There was a reported increase in numbers of Black students in distance. For example, in 1999 46 percent of all African students were in distance education (DoE, 2001:38). At the time, perceptions were that standards were better at these institutions, the

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infrastructure was of a higher level and most importantly, students could access these institutions.

Having considered a sample of universities as a precursor to a detailed analysis of the sectoral movements in race, it is clear that this presents a ‘narrow indicator of equity’ (CHE, 2004b:60). In other words, the major dimensions of equity of access are not considered, e.g. funding restraints, limitations in terms of programmatic access in specific disciplines and different levels of study. It is useful in that it serves as a measure of the change in the racial composition of the higher education sector. In the absence of specific benchmarks for growth of specific population groups either in the NPHE or any other policy document, it is difficult to measure if sufficient progress has been made. Pronouncements can be made regarding the increase in numbers and the change in participation by race and gender between 1994 and 2010.