1. There have been some calls for the Act to be reviewed, particularly in the context of governance challenges over the years. Some of the issues and proposals are as follows:
- The current Act is seen to limit the framing of the Code of Conduct of councils to principles and practices for avoiding conflicts of interest. Provisions for Council to discipline members for misconduct beyond matters of conflict of interest should be formulated.
- Some of the governance challenges have been attributed to the way councils are structured. Proposed solution included reductio of the current maximum of 30.
- Consideration must be given to other intervention measures, in addition to issuing a directive, appointing an independent assessor, and appointing an administrator.
- The current economic environment, the underfunding of universities, the massification of higher education without matching funding, amongst others, has led universities to establish entities with a view to increase and diversify their third-stream income generation. However, the Act is silent on the establishment and regulation of such entities.
- Section 38 provides for public higher education institutions to co-operate with each other in any manner to achieve the optimal utilisation of resources and the performance of their functions, and to establish national and regional structures to facilitate the cooperation and collaboration initiatives. However, it does not include partnerships and cooperation between and among private HEIs inter se; and between public and private HEIs.
- The issue of alignment of definitions of various terms with other Acts such as NQF Act has also been identified as requiring the Higher Education Act to be amended.
2. The proposed review has not included tenderpreneuring in the sector and capacity of the department. The question of tenderpreneuring should ordinarily be addressed in the Audit and Risk Committee of the universities. With regards to the capacity in the Department, an organisational review is underway with the intent to address the capacity of the department, and alignment of the structure with the Act and White Paper. It is not immediately clear that the latter process will have to be factored in the review of the Act.