非洲高校面临资金匮乏学生多的难题

    From VOA Learning English, this is the Education Report.
    这里是美国之音慢速英语教育报道。

    Education experts say Africa's growing higher education system is important to its economic development. But African universities face a number of issues, including emigration of top students, poor infrastructure, and high demand combined with a lack of funds.
    教育专家表示,非洲不断发展的高等教育体系对其经济发展具有重要意义。但是非洲各个大学面临一系列问题,包括高材生移民,基础设施差,以及高需求和资金匮乏相结合。

    University leaders from around the African continent met in Johannesburg last week to discuss how to solve these issues and others. The academics who attended the African Universities Summit say the job of educating Africa's students is harder than it has to be.
    来自非洲大陆的高校领导们上周在约翰内斯堡会面讨论如何解决这些问题以及其它问题。出席非洲高校峰会的学者表示,非洲学生的教育工作更加艰难。

    Engineering professor David Mfinanga is a vice chancellor at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. He says the main problem facing universities is the high number of students.
    工程教授戴维·姆菲南加(David Mfinanga)是坦桑尼亚达累斯萨拉姆大学的副校长。他说,各个大学面临的主要问题是学生人数太多。

    "Most countries are trying to increase the number of university graduates because it is important for economic development. But the resources are limited, so that affects quality as well, and therefore we are struggling to balance the two because you need the quantity, you need more graduates, but you need to maintain the quality, and the resources are limited."
    他说,“大多数国家都在试图提高大学毕业生数量,因为这对经济发展很重要。但是资源有限,以至于会影响质量。因此我们都在努力平衡这两者之间的关系。你需要质量,又需要数量,但又需要保持质量,而资源又是有限的。”

    Pinkie Mekgwe is an administrator at the University of Johannesburg. She says schools face another problem: money.
    萍琪·梅克维(Pinkie Mekgwe)是约翰内斯堡大学的一位管理人员。她说,各个学校还面临另一个问题:资金。

    Like many American universities, she says, African universities struggle for funding. But unlike American schools, African schools cannot ask students to pay more tuition.
    她说,像许多美国大学一样,非洲大学也在争取资金。但是和美国学校不同的是,非洲学校不能要求学生掏更高学费。

    And, the 2009 global economic crisis reduced African governments' budgets. So, Ms. Mekgwe points out, universities now receive even less funding.
    而且,2009年全球经济危机减少了非洲政府的预算。所以梅克维女士指出,各个大学现在获得的资金甚至更少。

    Ousmane Sene is director of the Senegal-based West African Research Center. He says governments also need to look at the result of having many university graduates but few job opportunities.
    奥斯曼·塞内(Ousmane Sene)是总部设在塞内加尔的西非研究中心的负责人。他说,各国政府还需要着眼于大学生很多但是就业机会很少这样一种结果。

    "What are you going to do with that if they just get out of university and they are out of a job? Because this is a real threat, this is a real conflict-ridden situation in Africa, having these thousands and thousands of graduates, postgraduate students, qualified, with plenty of degrees, expecting everything from society, and spending years milling around without getting a decent job, that's a real problem."
    他说,“如果他们一走出校园就失业了,我们要怎么办?因为这是一种真实的威胁,这是非洲矛盾重重的真实现状。有了成千上万的这些拥有学位的合格大学毕业生、研究生,对社会充满期望,花费数年时间却没找到一份体面工作,这是一种真实的难题。”

    There are no simple answers to the issues that African universities face. But, African educators say the issues are just as serious as many of the continent's other difficult problems, such as war, famine, poverty and quickly changing leaders. And in this case, they say, solving higher education's problems may help solve the others.
    非洲大学面临的这些问题没法轻易解决。但是非洲教育工作者表示,这些问题同非洲其它难题一样严重,像战争、饥荒、贫穷和领导人快速交替。他们说,在这种情况下,解决高等教育的难题可能有助于解决其它难题。

    I'm Jill Robbins.
    我是吉尔·罗宾斯。(51VOA.COM对本文翻译保留全部权利,未经授权请勿转载,违者必究!)