Many self-professed pundits seem to believe that the priority in building a Knowledge Hub is to first grow the number of students in Mauritius and attracting as many universities as possible. The logic goes that, once critical mass is achieved, Mauritius will impose itself as a credible Knowledge Hub, much in the footprints of Dubai Knowledge Village or the sprawling academic city in Qatar and apt to ‘pull’ the high brow higher education institutions rather than ‘push’ itself onto them.

It is true that many stakeholders may adopt in first stance a critical, nothing short of belittling outlook of Mauritius as too tiny to be considered or taken seriously. Size matters, may be the logo of an elaborate virility product campaign, but as is usually the case, may end up as a false premise. Pursuing numbers for the sake of numbers comprises many risks. Strategies and reforms that are geared to bring ‘more’ are often pursued at the expense of quality. It is hard to pursue a quantity and a quality prerogative simultaneously. Hence, we need to choose wisely. Strategies that promote numbers will almost certainly have a multiplier effect, which will make it hard to identify, zero in and extract deep rooted challenges without compromising the whole foundation. Similarly, once big numbers attained, it becomes harder to take corrective actions on independent issues as all issues become intermingled and interdependent.

Pursuing numbers can also erroneously bring about a shift in resource allocation and an erosion of factor endowments, to imperatives that are not priorities but gimmicks that are dressed up as focus areas only to later reveal that they engendered vote banks and status quos. This is the perennial challenge in making difficult choices that will reveal fruitful in the long term but costly in terms of votes and reelections in the short term, in a democratic regime.

Confusion and subversion

One needs to take stock that policies, strategies and reforms that promote numbers will shape vision and branding of the Knowledge Hub concept. Once voiced out by the Oracle or worse implemented, it becomes hard to pull back or change. Doing so depicts a faulty start for which lobbies need later admit defeat and failure, hardly easy to do! Nah…we can always revert to the age old solution of “pa mwa sa, li sa”. The aim of the game is confusion and subversion so that no one really remembers what the initial debate stood for and amidst chaos; we thrive until the next big scandal. But more so, a faulty start becomes costly and depicts tunneled vision planning. We need to be crystal clear of the brand and image that we want to build as a Knowledge Hub. This entails a difficult decision on its own, as it means saying no to vested interests and shortterm gains. I do not watch many movies but I caught up on the Hindi movie re-adaptation of ‘The Godfather’, Sarkar. The patriarch recurred the dialogue again and again throughout the movie, which can be translated as “one should well-assess long term loss before rejoicing on short-term gain”. It would seem to me, that some should take a break and visit the movies more often.

Next, chasing numbers will almost certainly imply a loss of control both in terms of setting the pace and tweaking the direction of growth. We certainly do not want to become victims of inadequate planning and inconsistent implementation. In the higher education sector in Mauritius, it is a fact that we exemplify the herd behavior style whereby a new strategy that works entails the movement of the whole system towards it.

We aim blindly in the same direction without understanding the specific nuances to each context where simply put, all will benefit more from leveraging the individual strengths and contributions of each player. Such a situation reminds me Game Theory and the Nash Equilibrium, only to remember what we learn from the Prisoner’s Dilemma. I may be alone, but I am a firm believer that the law of comparative advantage may work well in such a sector whereby greater gains and welfare of students will be achieved if we each focus on our own strengths and operate accordingly. Institutions that simultaneously pursue academic credentials, professional courses, executive programmes, adult learning, vocational courses and skills and trades are most likely to end up as knowledge junk yards rather than knowledge hubs. There lies the risk, of which we have to be cautious.

Unfortunately, the old adage is true in that jack-of-all-trade is master of none and in a sector as delicate as that of higher education, more so. While mastery may be the fruit of long dedicated experience and commitment, the nectar of mastery will almost certainly entail a move in the direction of quality, be it in the choice and implementation of an education platform, or curriculum development or generally put, imparting learning and knowledge.

In every sector of economic activity in Mauritius, we have well learned, well trained and highly experienced specialists that are manning the helm of corporations and institutions to manage and instill direction towards a collective goal. It baffles me to see how higher education, which is intended to be the fifth pillar of the Mauritian economy, remains oblivious and adrift to this unspoken rule. Higher education is by no means, too nascent or premature to perpetuate this tradition. According to the Tertiary Education Commission, we have 10 public funded institutions and 56 private institutions operating in the higher education space.

We have about 45,000 students, of which about 10,000 are abroad and the remainder in Mauritius pursuing tertiary level qualifications. Hardly nascent, I would say! Yet, we are plagued with the same repetitive mistakes and misnomers time and time again. The instances I need not mention for they are obvious to each and everyone as a major source of worry and concern. If we are not immersed in troubled waters, we probably have been through already or rather will be going through shortly. This is both an individual and a collective problem that we face, as a society.

Intellectual capital

Is it too late for us? I am convinced it is not. However, as said the late Nelson Mandela, the time for action is now. For an island devoid of any natural resources, Mauritius has always stood tall and mighty on the backbone of its intellectual capital. When I read of the problems that we are facing in the higher education sector, I feel like turning around and looking for the ‘intellectual capital’ only to find that I seem to be aiming for a needle in the haystack. In an age of George Siemens’ MOOCs popularized by Harvard and MIT’s EdX and Coursera, in an age of Clayton Christensen’s disruptive innovation in higher education on whether MOOCs should qualify for academic credit and degree award, where debates are so nuanced on the future of higher education, I feel that I am dragged back into the past with issues of inconsistent accreditations, confer of awarding powers and incoherence in adhering to pre-established quality assurance standards. I am hopeful that when faced with the cliff, we will awake to the fact that in addressing reform in higher education, the ‘what’ is common across many systems but the ‘how’ is most certainly context specific.

In such a case, we may well prescribe adequacy, but what we truly need is to unleash greatness and selfless pursuits in a sector that concerns our children, our neighbors, our society and the population at large. Let us remember that a problem exposed, although systemic, viewed positively is nothing more than an opportunity to bring about change.

In summer 2012, the UK faced an unprecedented crisis in the case of London Metropolitan University but stepped in and made the bold decision that was most certainly painful but was needed and acted upon, not only to address the issue but to send a strong signal on any eventual recurrence. Doing right is not a matter of option; it is a matter of choice.