Browsing by Author "Turyasingura, Wilberforce"

Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
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    Battling Academic Corruption in Higher Education: Does External Quality Assurance Offer a Ray of Hope?
    (Higher Learning Research Communications, 2011) Nabaho, Lazarus; Turyasingura, Wilberforce
    The post-1980s changes in the global higher education landscape have triggered a burgeoning of incidents of academic corruption in higher education institutions. Since 2000, the discourse on how to combat academic corruption has gained traction in higher education and quality assurance is advanced as one of the strategies for fighting corruption in higher education. In 2016, the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation) issued a “wakeup call” to quality assurance systems to take up a leading role in the battle against academic corruption in view of the massive societal risks associated with the vice. However, there is a dearth of empirical and conceptual studies on how the quality assurance systems, in general, and external quality assurance systems, in particular, can take up a leading role in the crusade against academic corruption. This conceptual article, using the crime– punishment model as an analytical lens, discusses how the national quality assurance agencies (and systems) can exercise the leadership role in combating academic corruption. The article advances the setting of academic integrity standards, institutional and program accreditation, accreditation of academic journals, sharing information and promoting whistleblowing, monitoring of institutions, applying sanctions, and ranking of higher education institutions on the basis of integrity indicators as options that are available to quality assurance agencies to exercise their leadership role in combating academic corruption. These approaches are likely to create both incentives and disincentives for the higher education institutions and staff in connection with engaging in academic corruption. Nevertheless, the article takes cognizance of the idea that external quality assurance is necessary but not sufficient in combating corruption at the academy level.
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    An exploration of the ‘African (Union Commission’s) perspective’ of quality and quality assurance in higher education: Latent voices in the African Quality Rating Mechanism (AQRM)
    (Latent voices in the African Quality Rating Mechanism, 2019) Nabaho, Lazarus; Turyasingura, Wilberforce
    Quality assurance of African higher education is at the top of the region’s development agenda. Prompted by the imperative to enhance the quality of higher education, the Africa Union Commission is implementing the African Quality Rating Mechanism (AQRM). The AQRM is a continental tool that affords higher education institutions an opportunity to conduct self-assessment and compare their performance against similar institutions based on a set of common criteria. The mechanism is envisaged to engender institutional cultures of quality and enhance the quality of African higher education. However, a dearth of knowledge exists about the latent notions of quality in higher education that the AQRM aims to assure and the implicit institutional-level quality assurance practices in the AQRM. Therefore, this interpretivist article, based on a review of the AQRM survey questionnaire, answered the following research question: What notions of quality in higher education and the institutional-level quality assurance practices are inherent in the quality standards of the AQRM survey questionnaire? The findings revealed that quality as fitness for purpose and exceptional are the notions of quality in higher education in the AQRM.
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    Organisational citizenship behaviour and service delivery in urban local governments in Uganda
    (Commonwealth Journal of Local Governance, 2021) Turyasingura, Wilberforce; Nabaho, Lazarus
    The quality of service delivery in decentralised local governments (LGs) in Uganda remains largely unsatisfactory, despite central government’s efforts to improve resource allocation and develop supporting legal frameworks. This has been partly linked to the extent to which LG staff exhibit ‘organisational citizenship behaviour’ (OCB). Extant literature has not given adequate attention to OCB in the decentralisation discourse, especially in sub-national governments within developing countries such as Uganda. This paper tackles the issue of OCB among LG employees and its relationship to service delivery by addressing the following questions: (a) what is the level of OCB among LG employees and (b) to what extent do various dimensions of OCB relate to the quality of service delivery in the decentralised LG context? The study is a cross-sectional survey of 165 LG staff in central Uganda. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected. Using content analysis and correlational analysis, the study found that OCB among LG employees is too low, and that higher levels of OCB are associated with improved service delivery. The study recommends that LGs should prioritise effective leadership and supervision, a client-centred performance culture, and empowerment of staff in order to promote OCB among employees and thereby enhance service delivery to local communities.
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    Quality Assurance of Higher Education Governance and Management: An Exploration of the Minimum Imperative for the Envisioned African Common Higher Education Space
    (Higher Learning Research Communications, 2020) Nabaho, Lazarus; Turyasingura, Wilberforce; Kiiza, Alfred K.; Andama, Felix; Beinebyabo, Adrian
    In 2018, as part of the African higher education harmonisation drive, the African Union Commission (AUC) issued the African Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ASG-QA). Within the ASG-QA, the AUC commits to promoting good governance and management in higher education institutions and provides governance and management as the second standard. However, there is a dearth of knowledge about the governance and management architecture for higher education institutions in the African higher education landscape that is either implicit or explicit in the ASG-QA. Against the above backdrop—using the ASG-QA as a source of data and content analysis as a data analysis method—the paper examines the governance and management imperative for higher education institutions in the African higher education landscape from the perspective of the AUC. Six themes relating to Africa’s higher education governance and management landscape emerged from the data: the role of the state (or government) in higher education, the internal governance framework, focus on quality and quality enhancement, observance of values of higher education, adherence to the principles of good governance, and capable leadership. The findings suggest that the governance and management architecture under the ASG-QA leans more towards providing common
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    The Third Mission of Universities on the African Continent: Conceptualisation and Operationalisation
    (Higher Learning Research Communications, 2022) Nabaho, Lazarus; Turyasingura, Wilberforce; Twinomuhwezi, Ivan; Nabukenya, Margaret
    The purpose of the study was to explore the conceptualization of the third mission in African higher education and the activities that universities are required to engage in and/or are engaging in to fulfil the third role. Method: The interpretive lens underpinned the study. Data were collected from the documents of the African Union Commission (AUC), in which the third mission is both implicit and explicit. We used content analysis as a data analysis technique. Results: The AUC conceptualizes the third mission as a role of universities, as a social role, as forging partnerships, and as being mutually beneficial to society and the university. Universities in Africa are implementing and/or required to implement 11 third mission activities aimed at bridging the gap between them and society. Almost all third mission activities are anchored to the classical missions of teaching and research associated with higher education institutions. Conclusions: We concluded that: (a) the third mission is built on the classical missions of universities; (b) the distinction between the classical missions and the third mission is that the first mission (teaching) involves the dissemination of knowledge through academic education while the second mission (research) hinges on the generation of academic knowledge, but the third mission involves both in a non-academic context; and (c) the third mission is a multidimensional concept. Implication for Theory and Practice: The study adds to the limited literature on the third mission of universities from a supranational perspective. Second, it extends the conceptual framework of Molas-Gallart
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    Understanding the governance dynamics of a supranational university: The African pioneering model
    (Tuning Journal for Higher Education, 2020) Nabaho, Lazarus; Turyasingura, Wilberforce; Aguti, Jessica N.; Andama, Felix A.
    Since the 1990s, university governance has attracted the attention of scholars. However, most of the extant studies focus on the governance of national-level universities and use national regulatory frameworks. Therefore, there is a dearth of studies that hinge on the governance of supranational higher education institutions, such as the Pan African University (PAU), with the aid of regional regulatory frameworks. Consequently, little is known about the governance architecture of supranational universities, which are a post-2010 phenomenon. In view of the above, the article answers the following question: How is the Pan African University governed within a multi-layer environment? Using an interpretive lens, data was collected from the Revised Statute of the Pan African University, 2016. Content analysis was used to analyse the resultant data. The findings revealed that observance of the values of higher education, adoption of the steering-at-a-distance university governance model by the African Union Commission and of the shared governance arrangement, and merit-based selection of staff are the hallmarks of the PAU governance architecture. The governance model of the PAU resonates with the governance architecture of country-level universities in form rather than in substance. The notable variations in the substance include the partial adoption of the philosophy of ‘letting the managers manage’, the existence of multi-governance layers, lay