Higher Education at the Crossroads

Abstract

Higher education in Zimbabwe has moved from a small elite system to a mass system in the last thirty years. At independence in 1980 there was only one university whose total enrollment was 2000 fulltime students but to date there are 8 public and four private universities with a total enrollment of more than 42,000 full time students. There are several polytechnics, teachers’ colleges and vocational schools. The numbers of black students in universities has increased from a mere 7 out of 100 students in 1958 to over 98% of the total university enrollment.