Surging demand for higher education ought to have given Kenya a good reason to clean up its universities. But as the number of private and public universities has grown over the past seven years, from 17 to 24 private and five to seven public institutions, so have concerns over the quality of learning.
Critics of private post-secondary education often argue that foreign universities in developing nations are commercial and profit-hungry. But these debates ring hollow in Sub-Saharan Africa, where the majority of private providers are religiously-oriented with non-profit business models. Religious institutions are the fastest growing type of post-secondary institution in almost every nation north of South Africa and south of the Sahara.