PhD programme empowers women in Sudan – A case study

In 2011, Izzeldin Osman founded a PhD programme in computer science and information technology at Sudan University of Science and Technology, or SUST, aimed at empowering women to enter more senior academic positions. So far, 12 women have graduated. Another 113 women are currently enrolled.

While these numbers aren’t astronomical, they are evidence of a gradually improving teacher-training environment in Sudan, a nation bubbling with talent but currently lacking the resourcefulness to unleash it, according to Osman. That, he says, will begin to change as his programme matures.

“We do not have a problem with women not wanting to specialise in science and mathematics,” said Osman, emeritus professor and former vice-chancellor of SUST in Sudan’s capital Khartoum. “We think this is good for the country.”

Osman presented an overview of his PhD programme at the African Network for Internationalisation of Education Conference held in Ghana from 5-7 October.

The programme, which blends distance learning with face-to-face faculty supervision, recruits professors from all over the world to teach a range of courses in computer science and information technology and to conduct collaborative research with students.

The objective is to train young lecturers in Sudan and enable them to obtain PhD degrees so that they can become full-time professors.

Encouraging women into the field

Although anyone outside of Sudan can apply to the programme, it specifically targets young female lecturers in remote areas of Sudan in an effort to encourage more women to enter the field.

While 56% of lecturers in Sudanese tertiary institutions are women, they comprise only 14% of all assistant professors, according to data Osman compiled from Sudan’s Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research.

The reason that so few women are promoted from lecturer to assistant professor, says Osman, is because PhD programming opportunities are so limited, especially in rural areas. Without a PhD degree, a lecturer cannot be promoted. This forces many lecturers to seek programmes outside the country, but that privilege is usually reserved only for those who can afford it.

To help bridge that gap, Osman says he wants to empower women and enable them to obtain PhD degrees locally. His goal is to increase the number of women in higher education so that they represent at least half of all assistant professors in Sudan’s tertiary institutions.

Overcoming scepticism

The locality of the PhD programme is beneficial to Sudanese students who cannot afford to study abroad, but it can also pose challenges when recruiting professors from other countries who may be hesitant, considering the fragile state of Sudanese politics.

“Many people ask us if it’s safe,” said Osman bluntly. “So I give them the emails of some Europeans and Americans who are already teaching. I tell them [the political unrest] is in the boundaries and in southern Sudan.” Last year, 10 professors from Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, Egypt, France, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom participated in the programme, although the number fluctuates each year.

Most of the course instruction is conducted online with a program called Cisco WebEx, but professors and students are required to meet for one week in Khartoum for face-to-face meetings once every year.

Although there are downsides to this kind of limited in-person interaction, it helps reduce the burden on professors who have hectic schedules back at their home institutions and on Sudanese students tied down with work or family responsibilities.

“I tried to start my PhD research more than once, but unfortunately it stopped because of my responsibilities of being a working woman and a mother,” said Eiman Kambal, a graduate of the programme. “There was also the difficulty of going abroad because of my familial ties in Sudan.”

Osman says it’s people like Kambal who he hopes to help.

Internet deficiencies and funding challenges

In most developing countries, access to the internet in rural areas can be problematic.

When a programme like the one at SUST so heavily depends on a stable connection, it can sometimes be impossible to complete the work. This forces many students in rural communities to commute to the nearest town with a university where the connection is stronger.

Funding the programme at SUST is also a struggle, as is the case for most universities and educational programmes around the world.

Although it is able to stay afloat with tuition fees – US$5,000 per year for foreign students and US$1,000 per year for in-country Sudanese students – plus funds from the Ministry of Information and Communications and the university at large, Osman says the programme needs a more sustainable approach. 

“When we started, we thought some of the international agencies would assist us, but it didn’t happen,” he said.

When asked how he envisioned the programme in five years' time, he said he hoped that “we are fully financed and can give scholarships to some students so they don’t have to pay fees”.