'This is about the credibility of qualifications in SA': Nzimande on deregistering Educor colleges

Higher education, science and innovation minister Blade Nzimande says Educor colleges will be given time to phase out pipeline students.

Educor must reimburse students where it is due.

The department’s director-general Nkosinathi Sishi cancelled the registrations of Educor institutions Damelin, CityVarsity, Lyceum and Icesa City Campus on Friday, saying they had not submitted annual financial statements in 2021 or 2022 or complied with the law

The institutions also had difficulties paying some of their academic staff last year and this year.

The four institutions were required to lodge an appeal on or before September 26 2023 but requested an extension to February 28. They are now requesting a further extension, the department said.

On Tuesday Nzimande briefed media on the implications of the department's decision. He said the institutions can be considered dysfunctional based mostly on daily complaints and concerns received from students, most of which remain unsolved.

The Higher Education Quality Committee has withdrawn the accreditation of some programmes for CityVarsity, Damelin and Lyceum.

The department has been flooded by complaints from students and staff about the institutions. Complaints are mostly unaddressed and include:

• alleged poor teaching quality;
• inadequate administrative support;
• underqualified staff;
• exploitation of low-income students;
• nonpayment of salaries; and
• corruption and bribery.

The premises of some institutions also closed suddenly after failure to pay rent, staff salaries and the municipality. 

Nzimande said the institutions were requested on January 8 to respond to a list of allegations of corruption but had not yet responded.

“This is about the credibility of qualifications in South Africa. If we allow one institution to get away with qualifications that are not up to standard, that is the image of the whole country,” he said.

Educor also allegedly misrepresented the number of students it had, claiming to have 50,000 students in the system while the true figure was 13,096.

The cancellation of the registration of City Varsity will take immediate effect and the institution must not enrol new students on any year of the programme.

The institution is also required to phase out pipeline students and submit a teach-out plan to the department and the Council on Higher Education.

“The teach-out plan must also include the number of students in the pipeline and when records will be uploaded onto the National Learner’s Records Database. The teach-out plan must indicate that returning students who did not complete the programme within the stipulated time will not be admitted post December 31 2023 and they will need to complete their programme at another institution. Students must be informed accordingly,” Nzimande said.

However, another challenge could be students repeating some modules or paying extra fees.

He said an institution that has been notified that its provisional registration or registration has been cancelled in terms of regulation 17 must inform its students within 14 days from the date of the registrar’s notice and notify the students of the arrangements that will be made to safeguard their interests.

The institution is also obliged to issue to each enrolled student a copy of his or her academic transcript.

Nzimande said they must:

• make adequate arrangements for affected students to complete their programmes at a comparable public or private institution;
• cease operating before or at the end of the academic year — any institution that fails to comply is guilty of an offence in terms of section 66 of the act; and
• ensure that no new students are enrolled after the date specified by the registrar.

There is not enough information available about the leadership structure at Educor, said Nzimande.

“There is no credible evidence to suggest the management of Educor is working to improve or correct some of the governance and compliance failures I have referred to. What we are seeing instead are students and staff being left stranded and we urge the affected staff to seek the assistance of the Labour Court and the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration.

“Under these circumstances and with the information at our disposal, it would be unconscionable to maintain the registration status of these four private institutions and allow ourselves to become complicit in gross governance and compliance failures.”

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