Doctoral Training and Higher Education in Africa

Book excerpt: Drawing on insights from across Africa, this book investigates the discourses and practices that guide doctoral training today. Higher education is regarded as key for driving development and innovation, creating an informed knowledge base equipped to tackle local and global challenges. For too long external forces defined education in the continent, but now African countries are revitalising higher education, designing doctoral training to fit distinctly African needs and contexts. This book investigates the history, present and future potential of doctoral training on international, regional, national and institutional levels. Bringing together expertise from both research and practice, the book analyses the frameworks and structures of the doctoral phase, and how institutions, supervisors, mentors and young scholars meet the challenges of training in real life. The book covers issues such as access to education, proactive recruitment, funding issues, practitioner expertise, enrolment and drop-out, across a range of countries including South Africa, Mozambique, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Benin, Ghana and Morocco. This book will be a rich resource for higher education administrators and policy makers, as well as researchers and academics with an interest in higher education in Africa.