The Commission for University Education has okayed students joining university this year to be admitted for courses that it is yet to accredit.
“The commission has worked with the relevant agencies to ensure that the compliance issues raised on the majority of the programmes have been addressed. As a result, the commission allowed the Placement Agency to admit students to the affected programmes in the 2019/2020 academic year,” CUE statement issued on Wednesday.
The statement comes in the thick of a revelation on some 133 courses that students are pursuing but are yet to be approved.
The statement issued said the admission of these courses was on a demand basis.
To give a nod to the university, the regulator demanded minutes of affected University Senate meetings showing approval of programmes to be mounted in Constitute Colleges.
This explains why the majority of universities coaching unaccredited courses are younger universities or are still under the wings of bigger universities.
However in November last year, the university placement agency asked CUE to validate undergraduate programmes offered in public and private universities.
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They also requested CUE to assess and declare capacities of each university for placement of government-funded students for the 2019/2020 placement cycle.
To honour the request, CUE submitted a list of courses on offer as of August 2018.
This included courses the commission had approved and those that had been given a go-ahead but yet to be accredited.
In the August report, CUE subjected 1,828 programmes to the special examination arising on the Placement Service’s request.
The commission findings raised issues on poor facilities, inadequate laboratory equipment for science courses mainly, shortage of teaching staff and teaching materials.
“The compliance issues were contained in an initial non-conclusive document that formed the basis for further consultations with CUE and individual universities ahead of the commencement of the selection process on February 6, 2019,” CUE boss Mwenda Ntaringwa said.
Ntarigwa in a statement to the newsroom said the commission worked with the relevant agencies to ensure that the compliance issues raised in most programmes are addressed.
This allowed the placement agencies to admit students to the unapproved courses in this year's admission process.
According to Universities Standards and Guidelines, each Programme should be supported by a minimum of two lecture rooms for a four-year Programme.