Page 14 - Professorial Lecture - Professor P van Rooyen

Institutions of Higher Learning in Namibia should improve the quality of
learning by paying attention to teaching methods, assessment systems,
interaction with other students and academics, availability of publications
and equipment (10). Fear of unemployment, lack of creativity, poor time
management and poor command of English were also mentioned as specific
weaknesses (64). The condition of buildings and campus grounds were
specifically mentioned as areas of concern.

An element that needs to be taken into account is that of political
correctness versus the inquisitive and discriminatory mind of the academic.
There is a difference between a national political and economic strategy and
political correctness for its own sake. A competitive university cannot
tolerate a general aura of correctness. It should rather be giving preference
to innovative candidates: the intellectual elites and entrepreneurs of the
future. The role of the university is to be seen then, as a generational source
of entrepreneurs. “To free the mind” and to create “idealists” who can think
“outside the box” in order to generate employment and other opportunities
in the unique set of circumstances created by the Namibian environment
(physical, social, political and economic).

In 2011, my philosophy class (both for Western Political Philosophy and for
African Political Philosophy) consisted of 18 students, many of whom I got
to know on a first-name basis and who are now prime movers in the
Namibian society, people like Tsakana Nkhandi, Michael Hamukwaya,
Edison Nengolo, Nicky Paavo, Rakkel Andreas. In 2015 my Philosophy class
numbers almost a 120 students, a blurred and nameless mass, with no
productive interaction between students and lecturer. If they get
somewhere in society it will not be because of me. I did a spot check on this
class on four occasions in 2015. Only three out of the 120 were reading a
book, any book, at that time. Only four read the newspaper on that
particular day. Only three were involved in any kind of physical exercise on
a sustained basis. I, as lecturer, want to engage those three or four, and can
make a meaningful contribution to their upbringing and future. At the
moment they totally disappear into the complacency of the 120. I do not
even know who they are, where I always used to know before.

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