University of Dhaka: in Search for Excellence Issues and Policy Recommendations
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University of Dhaka: In Search for Excellence Issues and Policy Recommendations Imtiaz Ahmed and Iftekhar Iqbal in association with Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) Bangladesh March 2018 ContentsContents Executive Summary 03 I. Background 03 II. Vision 04 III. Governance 05 IV. Recruitment of academic staff 06 V. Research 08 VI. Education, learning and training 10 VII. Campus Politics 15 VIII. E-learning environment 18 IX. Campus security 20 X. Issues of gender and the disadvantaged 20 XI. Soft power of the academic community 21 Concluding remarks: What next? 21 Acknowledgements 23 Appendixes 25 Executive Summary The policy paper, based on a series of conversations with major stakeholders in the higher education sector of Bangladesh, draws attention to some important measures to be taken up in order to achieve excellence at the University of Dhaka. This includes, among other pertinent issues: First, governance. With reference to the Dacca University Ordinance of 1973, it is suggested that the true spirit of the Ordinance needs to be channeled for the nourishment of professionalism in the University. The autonomy of the university must be understood from the perspective of political freedom, as well as academic professionalism, unhindered by external forces. Second, faculty recruitment and student admission. To maintain the quality of the academic environment of the university, it is important to ensure recruitment of the best students and best faculty members. This paper suggests measures to overcome the hurdles in achieving these goals. Third, the policy paper highlights the importance of reinventing campus politics by creating opportunities for both students and faculty members in the campus as well as the wider world. Finally, the policy paper highlights the importance and ways of achieving excellence within the context of global academic standards in teaching and research. I. Background In 2021, Bangladesh and the University of Dhaka (DU) will turn 50 and 100 respectively. The fates of these two entities are intertwined in many respects. Despite references to the University’s past glory and criticism of its present conditions, there has been little useful public discussion about possible ways of securing the University’s rightful place in the world of knowledge, learning and teaching. It is crucial that we start policy-oriented 3 and practical efforts in that direction. An opportunity towards that end was provided by a two-day conference and four workshops held during 2015-16, involving the participation of eminent scholars, policy-makers, academics, student-politicians and the non-political student community, as well as the wider public. These resulted in the publication of University of Dhaka: Making Unmaking Remaking in February 2016. Subsequentlys, two editions of the book came out in August 2016 and February 2017, followed by a Bangla translation of the same in February 2018. This policy paper is largely based on the four workshops and informal conversations with stakeholders, and is a sequel to the book. Each of the workshops engaged a different set of stakeholders: academics; policymakers, student politicians and the student community in general. The papers that were presented at the conference appeared as chapters in the book. The chapters touched on historical contributions and the evolution of the University of Dhaka and its contemporary situation, but most of these chapters also included broad- based and specific policy recommendations that would prove useful to recent discourses and initiatives in reforming higher education in Bangladesh in general and in the University of Dhaka in particular. We hope this policy paper will provide useful recommendations for stakeholders and policy-makers working for a better educational system in Bangladesh. II. Vision The University of Dhaka needs a declared vision, both short and long term. Discourses on the University is clearly focused on its political contributions in the past, particularly in the period from 1948 till 1990, without a sense of what it wants to achieve in the next few decades. This looks particularly odd as the university, the largest and oldest in the country, reaches its centenary in a few years. The Government of Bangladesh and the DU authorities need to formulate a holistic vision for the University in order to regain its reputation as an institution of higher education. First of all, it is important to set goals for DU. All its present conditions, bad or good, are accepted as given and we don’t know where we are headed in the quest for excellence. In some university rankings, DU appears in between 600 and 2500 universities (mostly in non- 4 learning and non-research categories) and it does not appear at all in most major rankings. Do we want to be at least within the first 100-200 top universities in the world? If so, we need to examine, debate and discuss the possible ways of meeting the criteria set for achieving that goal. In this respect, the following broader issues need focus: 1. Where DU should be in the next 10 to 15 years and how to reflect that target in the global indexes of universities 2. Whether the university will take the character of a research or a teaching university, or a combination of both, and how to formulate such characteristics 3. How to create space at DU for human capital investment infrastructure 4. How best to take advantage of the demographic dividend within the learning and research architecture of DU 5. What kind of politics the students and teachers of DU will practice in the campus, and what will be its nature? III. Governance By dint of the Dacca University Ordinance of 1973, the DU is a semi-autonomous institution, whose day-to-day administration is run by a good number of administrative and academic staff led by the Vice Chancellor and two Pro-Vice Chancellors. It is well known that the idea of autonomy has lost its true meaning over the past few decades and in fact, the Ordinance broadened the space for national politics on the university campus. A major question continues to be: what are the best ways to preserve DU as an autonomous space for higher learning and research? In Bangladesh, the Vice Chancellor of a public university is ‘elected’ through popular vote by faculty members and registered graduates, out of a panel of three, where the government 1 This is, however, limited to only five public universities, including University of Dhaka. 5 has the final say.1 Despite this election, the Vice Chancellor must have the blessing of the government of the day to run the university. Not surprisingly, a change of regime at the national level also sees a change of the Vice Chancellor at the University of Dhaka, as in other public universities. Such governmentalization of the university seems to be the result of the policymakers’ inability to distinguish between the ‘government’ and the ‘state’. A case in point would be the annual allocation of funds for the University of Dhaka. Since the bulk of the funds of the university, over 90 percent, are provided by the state, the government of the day makes it a point to remind the University that the government alone has the power to disburse such funds. ‘Autonomy’ of the University cannot be ensured as long as the state remains indistinguishable from the government. Each of the incumbent government needs to appreciate and ensure that universities in general, and DU in particular, function as national and state institutions, not as a space for national party politics. This could be done in one of two ways: 1. Amend the Dacca University Ordinance of 1973 and put a new clause that the funds of the state is guaranteed and the government of the day cannot change the allocation without prior approval of the University. 2. Discontinue the Dacca University Ordinance of 1973 and draft a fresh one. IV. Recruitment of academic staff The recruitment policies of a university are crucial for maintaining and promoting academic excellence. At DU, the recruitment and promotion practices in recent years have largely overlooked the need for recruiting brilliant candidates and instead, ensured politically motivated appointments. For example, more than 41 percent of the university’s faculty are full professors, the number being far greater than that of any other single category in the hierarchy.2 This may not be a major issue if we did not consider the fact that many universities with a smaller number of professors have secured top places in world rankings. For example, of about 2,400 faculty members of the National University of Singapore, Asia’s 2 In the University of Dhaka, the number of Professor is 887; Associate Professor, 322; Assistant Professor, 453;and Lecturer, 397. 6 no. 2 and world’s no. 15 university (QS 2018), there are less than 250 full professors. The University of Cambridge, consistently placed in world’s top three universities for decades in different indexes, has altogether 585 full professors (July 2015). To become a challenging place of higher scholarship and excellence in research, teaching, and learning, the University of Dhaka needs to fix this glaring mismatch, where about 900 professors have not been able to move the university to any considerable locus. This situation is partly a result of a non- transparent and, in most cases, politically biased recruitment process. Under the circumstances, the following recommendations may be considered: 1. The introduction of a transparent, independent and merit-based recruitment process that results in a single, combined and integrated faculty recruitment system. Before an application for faculty position is reached to the respective selection committee, the applicant should show evidence of research and teaching skills to the respective Department’s undergraduate and graduate students as well as faculty members, whose confidential opinions should be taken into account by the selection committee.