Students 'locked out' of varsities

Thousands of new applicants, too few places

- WENDY JASSON DA COSTA, ANITA NKONKI and TRACY-LYNN RUITERS

THE euphoria following one of the country’s best-ever matric pass rates has been tempered by the harsh reality that high marks do not guarantee a place at university. As the new academic year looms, tens of thousands risk unemployment unless they explore alternative career and study pathways.

Across the country, universities face an overwhelming demand with unprecedented numbers of first-time applicants. The University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) received 326 546 applications for 9 000 first-year places. UCT received 102182 applications for 4000 places, while UWC received more than 177000 applications for just 4715 places. The University of Johannesburg processed 450000 applications for its first-year intake of 11200 students, while Wits University received 160000 applications for about 5 800 places.

Similar pressures are evident at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology and North-West University. “It’s going to be absolutely catastrophic,” said Professor Wayne Hugo of UKZN. “Universities aren't getting enough funding to keep pace with the growth in bachelor passes and the demand for students to access university.”

Hugo said NSFAS also cannot fund everyone and blamed the crisis on government underfunding. He encouraged matriculants to focus on technical and vocational qualifications as well as nontraditional forms of education.

“Huge organisations like Vodacom, Google, Facebook, and Gemini all offer free courses that give you globally recognised qualifications,” said Hugo. “The other option is TVET colleges, where students can simultaneously work and acquire skills.

“What it means is that your chances of finding a job, if you get that kind of qualification, are starting to rise — especially because many university subjects can now be done by AI. If you're a lawyer, you can just load the case into AI and it’ll give you an answer. But if you’re a plumber, you need a person to go fix the toilet,” he added.