No one will join university through cheating-TCU

In the next few months after the form six examination results come out, the Tanzania Commission for Universities (TCU) will select students who will join various universities in the country. Our Staff Writer PROSPER MAKENE interviewed TCU’s Executive Secretary Prof. Sifuni Mchome on the selection process and how TCU plans to deal with academic cheaters who use fake certificates when applying for admission into higher education institutions. Excerpts:

QUESTION: What is TCU doing to ensure the admission process goes well?

ANSWER: In order to ensure the upcoming admission is well organised, TCU plans to strengthen its human resource and capacity building. TCU together with the Higher Education Students' Loans Board (HESLB),  the National Council for Technical Education (NACTE), the National Examinations Council of Tanzania (NECTA), and the higher education institutions are working together to ensure the upcoming admission of students into higher learning institutions goes well.

TCU, NACTE and NECTA have ensured that all form six and diploma academic results are captured to enable all applicants apply through the Central Admission System (CAS) without encountering problems.

Also TCU has requested NECTA to establish a database of applicants who are holding foreign certificates so as to capture their results directly from NECTA in order to increase awareness of applicants and the public at large on how to use CAS during registration and application processes.

Q. How does TCU plan to deal with those who apply for admission using fake certificates?

A. Through the CAS there is no cheating as the results are captured directly from NECTA and NACTE databases. Therefore we expect no one will join university through cheating.

Q. Any achievements made since you introduced the CAS system?

A. We have achieved a lot through this system. With CAS, an applicant is able to apply for admission into more than one institution at once, hence reducing application costs, time spent and the cost for travelling to different institutions where admission is sought.

CAS has addressed challenges related to forgery of certificates during the application process since all applications are lodged online and the examination results for each applicant are directly accessed from the NECTA and NACTE databases.

With the use of CAS, it has been possible to determine the actual admission capacity of each institution. For the first time in the history of Tanzania, almost all eligible applicants were admitted into higher education institutions. CAS has managed to control multiple admissions as the system allocates the applicant to only one programme out of the many chosen programmes.

The system generates important data for use by researchers, policy makers and decision makers. It also has managed to notify applicants who do not qualify in the early stage of the application process.

Q. How does the Foreign Awards Assessment System (FAAS) recognise foreign academic awards? Any challenges concerning this system?

A. Any one who wants their foreign awards to be recognised has to apply electronically directly to TCU's Foreign Awards Assessment System (FAAS).

They do so by opening an electronic account in TCU website and uploading different documents which allow the assessment to take place.

Apart from the copy of the certificate/degree award, they have to upload the respective transcript, their recent photo, form four and six NACTE certificates OR their equivalent, course curriculum, an admission letter and pages of the passport showing their particulars and entry visa to the country they were studying.

All of these are to be certified by an advocate/an officer of law. They also have to scan and upload the bank pay in slip to show they have paid the necessary fee for that evaluation.

After submitting these, TCU staff checks for the completeness of the application and if satisfied that the critical information is there, the applicant is given a date on which they can collect their evaluation certificate (for Tanzanians) and letters (for foreigners).

In collecting their evaluation, they have to bring with them the original documents they have uploaded, for verification.

As for the challenges encountered, they include incomplete information - sometimes the applicants do not have in hand sufficient information to do the evaluation.

They may miss form four or form six certificates on which they need to go to NECTA and process a result slip which is normally sent directly to TCU. Some do not have degree transcripts or have a crude handwritten provisional degree certificate.

Meanwhile, some applicants scan their documents such that they have very high bytes and therefore cannot be uploaded and in some cases applicants are missing the pre-requisite to join degree level training or they cannot clearly explain their path into the degree program.

In a few cases we do set-up interviews with the applicants to verify some of the queries. That takes time and has cost implications. Another challenge is that there a few applicants who either do not know or find it difficult to do the online application. We guide them on how to do so.

Q. How many students will be enrolled in higher learning institutions in the 2013/2014 academic year?

A. TCU and NACTE institutions have the capacity to enroll 60,000 students per year in 69 higher education institutions. However, given the potential pool of applicants, it is projected that the 2013/2014 admission will be about 50,000.

Q. Any future plans?

A. In future, TCU plans to process admission of postgraduate applicants through CAS.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN