Forum bemoans low level of PhD enrolment in universities
The Minister of State in charge of Tertiary Education, Prof. Kwesi Yankah, has lamented the low level of PhD enrolment in the various universities across the country.
According to him, none of the universities in the country could truly qualify as a research university.
He noted that the percentage of PhD enrolment in the universities is relatively low, pointing to the University of Mines and Technology (UMaT)and the University of Ghana as a perfect case in point.
Source: UGC
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Currently, out of the 90 per cent of post-graduate students’ enrolment in the universities in the country, only 10 per cent are in the doctoral programmes.
The University of Mines and Technology (UMaT) has the highest of 1.4 per cent of PhD enrolment while the University of Ghana has just 1.1 per cent.
"The percentage of doctoral students per total enrolment for all universities in the country still leave much to be desired," Prof. Yankah said.
He made the comment during the opening session of the University of Ghana (UG) Doctorial forum.
The forum which was held at Legon last Friday brought together stakeholders to discuss the theme: “Promoting PhD education in Ghana”.
It was geared towards discussing the merits and challenges of PhD training in the country, as well as sensitise stakeholders and the public about PhD education.
“For private universities in Ghana that presented statistics to the National Council for Tertiary Education (NCTE) in 2014, only 1.8 per cent of students were pursuing post-graduate studies and none of those was enrolled in a PhD programme,” Prof. Yankah disclosed.
He expressed great concern with the low level of PhD enrolment in the University of Ghana in particular, saying “if the premier university has such a poor enrolment in doctorate programmes, you can imagine how adversely this would affect other universities and sectors, where doctoral degrees would be crucially required.”
He, however, admitted that resource constraints, limited library resources on topic chosen, poorly equipped science and technology laboratories, amongst other things, often become challenges to doctoral work in most African countries.
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“Indeed, many a time, the high cost of bandwidth constraints an institution’s research capabilities and limits graduate students’ access to key and crucial data bases.
“As a result of this, doctoral students and their supervisors are not likely to be abreast of current theoretical and comparative literature, which provide new and refreshing insights in dissertation projects,” Prof. Yankah added.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education has announced that henceforth having a PhD is a requirement for any lecturer looking to teach at the University level.
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Source: YEN.com.gh
