An alarming shortage of qualified lectures grapples learning in the higher learning institutions as reported by Varsity officials.
These have been revealed at a time when there are a lot of concerns being raised by the stakeholders in the education sector about the quality of the graduates being produced in the country.
Vice-chancellor professor Kusiluka of Mzumbe University while speaking at a meeting where government officials, key stakeholders in education and other vice-chancellors were present said that the problem of shortage of qualified lectures remains unresolved even after making several appeals to the government over the same issue.
In other areas, there is regular employment of the members of the staff but unfortunately, it appears like employment of the university teaching staff has been forgotten. We continue to make an appeal that staffing Varsities also be done, the vice-chancellor said.
Professor Joyce Minister of Education, Technology, Vocational Training and Science in her response said that the issue is known by the Ministry and that funds have been set aside to sponsor a thousand scholars who are pursuing post-graduate degrees and after they qualify they will be employed as a way of resolving the issue.
She added that this was one of the steps taken by the ministry to ensure quality education in all Varsities is provided. Also, this will provide a permanent solution to the problem.
The ratio of lecturers to students is unsatisfactory. The shortage has been attributed to the cost of producing a PhD holder and the long duration of almost 10years before one qualifies.
The problem is affecting private universities more as compared to public universities. Some of these private institutions have resolved using assistant lecturers who are undergraduates to teach some courses.
This, however, has been the route cause for the poor or low quality of undergraduates being produced in the country.
Shortage of qualified lectures grappling the learning in Varsities has also been attributed to more universities and colleges coming up yet the number of qualified lectures remains almost constant. This increase in the number of institutions is not proportional to the number of professionals.
Dr Simboja former lecture Mzumbe University suggested that one way of reducing the problem is by the government enabling various universities to develop their Human resource as per their needs through giving them loans or increasing the budget allocation for university human resources development.
