Siyaphumelela student success initiative to expand in 2024

The Kresge Foundation will be funding a third phase of its impactful Siyaphumelela student success network at South African universities from 2024, aiming to extend the initiative to up to 20 of the country’s 26 public universities.

According to the United States-based private organisation’s request-for-proposal document distributed to vice-chancellors on 27 November 2023, institutions selected to become part of the network will be eligible for grants totalling between ZAR2.75 million (US$146,000) and ZAR4.1 million (US$217,000) over three years.

This comes as state funding for higher education in South Africa is being cut due to fiscal pressure on the government.

Funding under threat includes earmarked grants, such as those made in terms of the University Capacity Development Programme (UCDP), an important instrument that institutions have been relying on to help them promote equitable student success.

Serious concern

Student participation and success rates at South African universities have been a “serious national concern” since the dawn of a new political dispensation in the country in 1994 – “especially the racial dimension of access and success”, higher education specialist Professor Wendy Kilfoil points out in a report about student success at the University of Pretoria (UP), one of the original five partners in Phase 1 of the Siyaphumelela initiative.

Access

Nasima Badsha, former CEO of the Cape Higher Education Consortium (CHEC) and a former deputy director general of higher education in the South African department of education, notes that enrolment at South Africa’s public universities has more than doubled since 1994, reaching 1.1 million in 2022.

At the same time, the demographic profile of the country’s student body has been “radically transformed from the apartheid past”, she says in Transforming Lives at the Institutional Level, a book about equity promotion initiatives worldwide, published earlier this year.

In 2019, 77% of South Africa’s student body was black African, 11.8% white, 5.8% coloured and 4.3% Indian/Asian (population group categories as used by Stats SA). This nearly mirrors the demographic composition of the South African population overall, which – in the same year – was 81% black African, 9% coloured, 8% white and 3% Indian/Asian.

“The availability of [National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS)] funding has produced a remarkable change in the profile of students in the sector by allowing for the inclusion of far more students from poor families,” higher education researcher John Butler-Adam confirms in a report on Siyaphumelela. NSFAS is the South African government’s bursary scheme for financial support of students.

Success

However, marked disparities persist in graduate outcomes, with higher drop-out and lower throughput rates achieved, particularly by black African and coloured students, compared to their white and Indian/Asian peers, Badsha says.

This is blamed on the poor schooling and socioeconomic conditions typically experienced by students coming from quintile 1-3 schools, which is used to describe schools situated in communities which are resource-deprived.

Fortunately, Badsha notes, there has been a concerted effort by the university sector, supported by government policy and other players, such as philanthropic donors, to address the academic development needs of the majority of students to achieve more equitable outcomes.

‘We succeed’

A key player in the growing student success movement in South Africa is the Siyaphumelela (‘We succeed’ in isiXhosa) initiative, launched in 2014.

It seeks to build institutional capacity to collect and analyse student data to determine when and why students are failing so that institutions can focus on effective interventions.

The initiative is being managed by the South African Institute for Distance Education (SAIDE) as the “backbone organisation” coordinating a range of services, including workshops and coaching.

Phases

In the first phase, there were five grantees, and the second phase saw the initiative being extended to include more historically disadvantaged institutions. Funded partners grew from five to seven, and a further 10 institutions joined as participants or associates, bringing the total to 17. See the Siyaphumelela website for a list of current partners, associates and participants.

In its third iteration, Siyaphumelela aims to increase participation by South Africa’s public universities to 78%, up from 19% at the start of the initiative in 2014.

The network wants to advance and refine progress made in the first two phases of the initiative.

Key areas

Siyaphumelela encourages three key areas of evidence-based student success practices: supporting students, using data and transforming institutions.

It wants “a more student-centred culture in South Africa’s higher education system to improve student completion rates and reduce race and gender equity differences”, the initiative says on its website.

To this end, it works to enhance “institutional capacity to collect and use student data to improve student success across the higher education system”.

Ultimately, it aims to “expand evidence-based student success efforts on a national scale, using a networked approach that builds on existing strengths, shares capacity throughout the system, and serves institutions based on their current needs and abilities”.

Progress

Institutions that have been participating in the network have registered “notable progress” in “increasing academic equity in retention and course success rates”, the request-for-proposal document reads.

At one of the participating institutions, Indian/Asian students’ success rate increased on average by 23%, black African students’ by 18%, coloured students’ by 16%, and white students’ by 10%. This has helped shrink the achievement gap between black and white students.

University capacity development

In the second cycle of the University Capacity Development Programme of the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET), stretching from 2020 to 2023, Siyaphumelela was recognised as a trusted partner and as an Institutional Grants Sub-Programme.

Universities not directly funded by Siyaphumelela could incorporate network participation into their UCDP projects. This allowed them to cover subscription costs and other expenses related to Siyaphumelela capacity-building activities, supplementing what they already received as network members.

Siyaphumelela anticipates that the DHET will again allow universities to do this in the third cycle of the UCDP from 2024 to 2027, but concerns have been raised by recent budget cuts in South Africa.

In his 2023 medium-term budget policy statement on 1 November, South African Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana announced steep state spending cuts – some already kicking in this year, with more to follow over the next two years.

University World News has received confirmation from Mandisa Cakwe, Director of the DHET’s University Capacity Development Directorate, that “the UCDP, like all other funding instruments in the department, is affected by the budget reprioritisation”.

However, she allayed fears of immediate cuts to funding already earmarked for the current financial year, saying that “universities will receive their full allocation for 2023-24 as planned”.

The workaround employed by the DHET to make this possible is that “interest accumulated by universities from UCDP funds and unspent funds will be utilised to cover the budget cuts”.

Investing in student success

Inyathelo, the SA institute for university advancement, reported recently that there has been a noteworthy rise in philanthropic donations to South African universities, with an even split between national and international funders.

Funding Siyaphumelela represents a major investment by the Kresge Foundation in improving student graduation rates in South African – US$12.3 million over the first two rounds, with at least an additional $3 million budgeted for the next round.

Call to SA universities

The request for proposal was distributed to all 26 public universities in South Africa on 27 November 2023. The outcome of the selection process will be announced on 1 May 2024, with the third phase of Siyaphumelela set to kick off in June.

This is the first article in a series focusing on the Siyaphumelela initiative.