A Case for public funding support for ‘private’ higher education in PNG

The incumbent National Alliance Party led government in Papua New Guinea (PNG) handed down its 2011 budget recently. All up, the projected spending is to the tune of just over 9 billion PNG Kina, approximately 4 billion Australian dollars.

This is the budget that we hope begins to underwrite the implementation of the Vision 2050 national development plan.  In my blog entry of 18 October, 2010, I wrote that the higher education sector is being called upon to increase by tens of thousands its output of trained workforce required in both the public and private sectors to carry PNG forward. 

PNG will need all of its six universities, four public and two private, to expand to increase access and output. However, when additional funding is necessary across the sector, the public universities receive budgetary allocations, and the two ‘private’ universities on the face of it seem to miss out altogether.

In the case of Divine Word University (DWU), this seems to be against the spirit of the current partnership relationship that the institution has with the state.  Since 21st August 1996 (National Executive Council Decision No: 134/96) DWU is recognized as a partner university in the development of higher education in PNG. As of 15th of October 2003 (National Executive Council Decision No: 187/03), it is recognized as an agency of higher education in PNG. Its programs are accredited by the Commission for Higher Education.  Its students are drawn from all levels of PNG society many from disadvantaged regions.  Many of its students have parents in formal employment who contribute to the state in paying taxes. DWU’s increasing numbers of alumni are and will contribute to the nation in numerous capacities both in the public and private sectors.

With such benefits flowing to the nation from private universities, the question is why there is again no budgetary support?  Perhaps this is due to how the word ‘private’ is defined and applied to the two non-state universities. What the term ‘private’ translates to as applied to universities, varies in terms of the goals and contexts. In mainly wealthy nations, a private university is a corporate entity engaged in the delivery of the higher education product as a commercial venture. The primary motive for engagement in higher education is therefore the bottom line for the provider and the promise of high returns in employment and salaries for the student customer. Any benefits to the common good that may flow are happy coincidences.

In the developing world contexts such as PNG, universities which are purely commercial in interests are not likely to be going concerns any time soon. The two universities currently labeled as ‘private’ are established and run by either a religious organization, as the case with DWU, or a Church denomination in the case of Pacific Adventist University (PAU).

DWU’s involvement in higher education is driven by a sense of altruism or a commitment to serving the common good in a context of need.  This is the basis of the partnership relationship that it has with the state of PNG, an understanding that the state alone is not able meet the needs of its people.  

At a time when the nation needs all its tertiary institutions to massively increase the training of the its human resource, and there is more money to spend, it is time perhaps to consider extending  a helping hand to the ‘private’ universities in order to enable them to further support national development needs.  In doing so, the state also tangibly supports the PNG students both pre and in service who are enrolled in these institutions who otherwise may be denied access to higher education for lack of capacity at public universities. DWU’s graduate output is increasing by the year. DWU’s current enrollment figure stands at 3050 with a projected enrollment at 5000 by 2016. It can do more and some level of state support will help it go a long way.

A Higher Education Teaching and Learning Philosophy

Helping students swallow seeds from which beautiful tomorrows will grow

In the revised application form for promotions, staff in my university now are required to outline their teaching and learning philosophies. As I completed  mine, I reflected, for the first time really, on what my teaching and learning philosophy is. As it just happened, I had been processing the final portfolio assignments of one of my literature classes. Through this activity that I came upon an appropriate analogy, the analogy of swallowing water melon seeds. The analogy captures well what teaching is about for me. The student wrote [with some modification from me] in concluding the portfolio:

Studying literature is like eating water-melon. Your first action will be to carefully remove the seeds before every bite. But seeds are the most significant things from which beautiful tomorrows will grow.

Reflecting on the philosophical insight of this analogy makes me see how meaningful this is for me as a lecturer. The act of teaching and learning to me becomes an art often times of making knowledge (the seeds) palatable to help students comprehend (swallow) it, and then observe the students’ growing appreciation for it (the sprouting and rooting of seeds).

Considered in the context of current questions about the purpose of universities, to me, the analogy underscores the view held by many students and indeed by other groups both inside and outside the university that not all programs or units or components of knowledge in a program are useful or relevant.  They treat these programs or units, mainly in the social sciences, as ‘the watermelon seeds’ that on first instinct are to be dug up and flicked off or in the least unwillingly tolerated as having little utility.

The challenge for the lecturer, and indeed the university at large, is to make these ‘seeds’ palatable for the students and others to swallow now with the certain knowledge that they will come to enjoy the sweetness of their fruit later in life. These ‘seeds’ have value not just for the individual but for the society at large.