‘Create equal admission processes for all universities’

The President of the Presbyterian University College, Ghana (PUCG), Rev. Prof. Emmanuel Adow Obeng, has called for the creation of equal admission processes for all universities in the country to address the low student numbers in private universities.

He said the current admission system favoured public universities, a development which, he said, had led to almost all private universities facing dwindling enrolment figures.

"If this action is not checked, it will, in the very near future, lead to the collapse of many private universities," he said.

Rev. Prof. Obeng made the call at the 17th matriculation ceremony of the PUCG on its Asante-Akyem campus in Agogo in the Ashanti Region last Saturday.

The matriculants included the second batch of fresh students into the university’s Faculty of Law.

This year, the university admitted 614 students into various programmes and campuses, out of which 352 are males.

Challenges

Rev. Prof. Obeng further stated that the private universities had to adhere strictly to the quotas approved by professional councils which oversaw health and medical programmes in the country.

“The private universities also need to pay attention to National Accreditation Board (NAB) quotas on faculty-student ratios in departments,” he said, claiming that in the public universities, the quota system was not strictly adhered to.

He also mentioned unfavourable regulatory policies as some of the difficulties faced by private universities.

"By law, all private universities are to be affiliated to public universities for mentorship. This has created a situation where affiliation charges have become a major source of internally generated funds (IGF) for the public universities.,” he added.

For instance, Rev. Prof. Obeng said, in the current academic year, the PUCG was indebted to its mentor and affiliating universities by over GHc200,000 in affiliation fees.

He expressed the hope that the current reforms the government was undertaking in the tertiary education sector would give private universities the leverage to contribute their quota towards national development.

He further appealed to the government to consider developing specific policies for the growth and development of private universities.

Preparation

Rev. Prof. Obeng said the PUCG was putting in place measures to enable it to take advantage of the expected increase in the intake of free senior high school students in the 2020 academic year.

“To this end, we have developed and received accreditation to commence one graduate and two undergraduate programmes, namely, MSc. Financial Risk Management; BSc. International Development and BSc. Computer Engineering.

“These are important additions to the curriculum offerings in the university. By this action, the PUCG has increased its undergraduate programme offerings to 17, while our postgraduate offerings have also moved to five programmes,” he added.