Prime Minister Edouard Ngirente has said that the government has, since September this year, embarked on reforms designed to improve University of Rwanda's funding model.. He was speaking during the 8th graduation ceremony of the University of Rwanda that took place in Nyagatare district on Friday, November 18. As we know, improving quality education in higher learning institutions is a process. It cannot happen overnight. The Government is aware of the challenges that the University of Rwanda is still facing, and we are fully engaged as Government to address them in a sustainable manner, he said. To assess the magnitude, Ngirente said that since September 2022, the Government of Rwanda has embarked on a comprehensive assessment. “This assessment aims at improving the quality of tertiary education, repositioning the University of Rwanda to the respected ranks of the best universities globally. This assessment will reveal additional reforms required to improve the performance of the university. Some of those reforms will lead to improving the funding model of the University of Rwanda and making it more efficient and sustainable, he said. He said that this assessment will devise modalities for the rationalisation of the University of Rwanda assets including infrastructure, efficiency in the management of campuses, and their rationalisation. It will also deal with other different aspects leading to improvement of quality education for students, he noted. Since 2016, the University of Rwanda hosts four African Centres of Excellence, and Ngirente said that these promote regional specialisation in thematic areas that address regional challenges and strengthen the capacities of universities to deliver quality training and applied research. This has increased visibility of the University of Rwanda among other things. We appreciate that, currently, through these Centres of Excellence and sponsored research projects by our partners, the University of Rwanda offers postgraduate studies, including Master’s and PhD programs. This is a commendable achievement, he said. The official said that the Government of Rwanda is committed to continue supporting University of Rwanda to fulfil its mission of improving the quality of education and transforming the university into a research-led one. This is our priority because we all recognise the critical role of research in generating innovation-based solutions, he added.
