As David Mwanje writes, this book further contains a thorough description of everything that educational stakeholders must know, including supporting literature and practical models alongside strategies for planning and implementation.
Dr Muganga is best known for his thought-provoking reforms in the education sector. As the vice chancellor of Victoria University, he has used every public forum to call for an overhaul of the tertiary level of education. His latest form of advocacy is the book, Authentic University.
In an interview with The Observer, he said the inspiration behind the book starts with his own experience in trying to understand that level of education in the East African region.
“I noted a need for our universities to produce graduates important to themselves, their families, and the country. I decided to write a book, which proposes to overcome the manifold shortcomings of the contemporary post-secondary school by offering an innovative education that corresponds to the realities of the modern era,” he says.
To him, a university should blend the concept of student-centered education to provide students with a personalized learning experience that develops distinct skills and competencies required by today’s employers.
In this book, he argues that universities nowadays fail to form personal connections with each unique student that brings a diverse set of strengths, interests, skills, and needs, ignoring the heterogeneity of the student body and enforcing mass-produced learning as they shuttle students along a programmed assembly line of lecture halls.
PRACTICING WHAT YOU PREACH
Using his position as vice chancellor at Victoria University, he has already started the journey of practicing what he preaches.
“We have changed the examination process to ensure that all examination papers are done online, and students are tasked to apply knowledge of the real world experiences in their answering, rather than focusing on the old system of examining students based on recalling the memorized notes from lecturers and books. Class work and practical learning is taking 70 per cent of the assessment while exams take 30 per cent,” he says.
“We are the only university in the country with a career and employability program, designed to empower all students with soft skills and replaced the usual internships, with longer periods of placement of our students in the real world of work, in a tightly monitored process, to ensure that they graduate with two transcripts; the academic and soft- skills transcript.”
According to Muganga, the feedback received so far is encouraging.
“We have so far sold about 20,000 copies all over the world. I have interacted with Dr Chrysestom Muyingo, the state minister for Higher Education, regarding this book and he applauded me for the effort and promised to ensure all top management officials of the education ministry are sensitized about the contents of the book and my proposals about education and employability of our youth in the country,” he says.
Whether Muyingo fully buys into Muganga’s proposal to overhaul of our university education remains to be seen but Muganga insists this revolutionary approach to education that incorporates the role of the instructor is the way to go.
In the book, he believe that lecturers in all universities should stop acting as custodians of knowledge, much as in certain instances they might be more informed than the students. He also reasons that students can gradually learn on their own by discovering.
“If students learn this way, they will easily understand and master the concepts and will stop merely cramming concepts they cannot understand,” he says.
In the fourth chapter of the book, he calls for the prioritization of investment in innovation and research. He says integration of these aspects into the classroom will not only help Uganda and the region to reposition itself within the globalized and creative economy, but also create more jobs for many jobless graduates.
Secondly, he calls for the need to change the structure and goals of universities. With the implementation of recent technology, many university courses have shifted from traditional in-person lectures to online material and assessments.
“We need to embrace online education since it’s affordable. We must start leveraging ICT, virtual and meta-verse technology. For instance, where a leading public university spends Shs 5bn on printing examination answer sheets, with an authentic learning system, there is digital automation of exams, electronic examinations, and electronic sheets, students use gadgets to log in, and they are proctored online after which they submit and their answer sheets are electronically transmitted for electronic marking whereupon the results reflect on the student’s dashboards and at the senate’s portal,” he says in the book.
Similarly, he further says that with a digital library, a university will not need a hefty budget for buildings to house infrastructure and the purchase of shelves for hard copy books, maintenance, and salaries of librarians and other costs.
However, in spite of Muganga’s bold approach for reforms, the education sector continues to be led by people aged 60 years and above and may not fully embrace his rapid approach. But, this is the least of his worries.
“As long as these senior managers are willing to adopt the new ways of teaching, we can together make a big difference in our country’s education. We should take advantage of their expertise, to come up with and also embrace new ways of teaching,” he says.
Still, it is hard to see how Muganga’s proposed reforms can be effected without disrupting the education system. He addresses this in chapter seven by reasoning that no matter the pace, it would gradually require an overhaul of the education system.
“University managers, lecturers, and students must appreciate that learning and assessment of learning, under authentic education, stretches beyond the walls of the classroom. They bring to the classroom experiences, knowledge, beliefs, and curiosities and authentic learning provide a means of bridging those elements with classroom learning,” he says.
He adds that the essence of authentic learning is to think of it as integrating elements of apprenticeship in the learning process in any university. What is without doubt is that the concept of authentic learning will take time to be absorbed and any university attempting to do it may first have its staff re-skilled or re-trained in its implementation.
To this, Muganga says it should not be haphazardly integrated with any given university in Uganda, lest they diminish the purpose of making learning experiences authentic in the first place.
“However, the beauty of authentic learning, is that it is possible to start implementing it, in a phased manner or what one would say, incrementally. Like at Victoria University, we started Work-Integrated Learning, which creates an extended interface of a student in the real world of work, in a monitored and assessed process; much longer and more useful than the usual internships, known by many students or our ordinary universities.”
If indeed policymakers do indeed follow up on the book’s reforms, Muganga sees a future education sector where lecturers bring a real-world context to lecture rooms. To him, this is the future of learning.
“Students will become adults in a world more complex than their own and will have to solve real-world problems creatively and collaboratively,” he says.
mwanjedavid3@gmail.com
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