ENHANCING THE QUALITY OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN AFRICA: EXPLORING THE COVENANT UNIVERSITY BUSINESS MODEL

Higher education is a tool of high value to the welfare of any society. It is central to the resolution of the multifaceted challenges of development that face countries in the world today. This is anchored on the premise that education breeds individuals who are intelligent; act rationally, able and willing to solve problems regarding their own existence as well as that of the groups and organizations to which they belong (Mella, 2014). However, most of the Universities in Africa are reputed for producing ‘half-baked’ graduates, unfit for employment anywhere. Recently, in a study conducted by the Inter-University Council for East Africa on the quality of graduates in Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda and reported by Mohamedbhai (2014), it was found that between 51 percent and 63 percent of graduates from these countries were ‘half-baked.’ In order to reverse this and other negative trends affecting higher education, Covenant University (CU) has set out to achieve the goal of transforming higher education in African. The objective of this paper, therefore, is to bring into focus the relevance of Covenant University Business model for enhancing the quality of higher education. The model is considered to offer the right approach as the acquisition and understanding of higher education issues turn away from a focus on the learner just finishing the training to the more holistic approach of actively assimilating what is learnt for further use.