Impediments to Pursuing Graduate Studies in South Africa: The Role of the Family, Social Class, and Race

Abstract

Increasing the number of graduate students has been identified as a priority for South African universities. Despite the shortage of graduate students in South Africa and the impetus to increase the number of graduate students, little is known about some of the impediments that undergraduate students, particularly Black students, face in pursuing graduate school. This paper critically examines the role of the family, social class, and race in considering the pursuit of graduate studies, from the perspective of students. The research adopts intersectionality as a theoretical framework and is based on focus group interviews with student participants. The findings indicate that race and social class must be understood as factors that operate concurrently and that participants’ educational plans are informed by the needs of their family and by raceclass factors. Socio-political and economic factors in South Africa are also discussed in relation to the family, class, race and the pursuit of graduate studies.

Race, representativity, and the (im)probability of being a Black African professional psychology graduate: an institutional case study

“…In terms of factors pertaining to the availability of Black African individuals in the recruitment pool, Pillay and Kramers (2003) initially identified how, when compared with White students, Black African students may experience additional family and sociocultural pressure to find employment and start earning sooner rather than delaying for the purposes of postgraduate study. The financial difficulties and sociocultural pressures preventing Black African students from pursuing postgraduate study persist today (Department of Higher Education and Training [DHET], 2023a; Dominguez-Whitehead, 2017), effectively limiting the diversity of high-quality Black African applicants for professional psychology training programmes in South Africa.…”

Pedagogical Translanguaging as a Socially Just Strategy for Multilingual Students in Occupational Therapy

“…Inequalities in higher education across the world remain persistent, resulting in disproportionate attainment of outcomes among population groups (see Chesters and Watson [1], Dube [2] and Glass et al [3]. In South Africa, despite the overall racial composition of the student body changing in the last two decades, with Black students making up the majority [4,5] their rate of success remains disproportionately low. In addition, Black students continue to be the minority in some programmes across historically White institutions.…”

A Differential Effect of Research Teaching Innovation on Dissertation Completion Rate and Pass Mark at TGSL

“…This contributes to the concern regarding deficiency of post-graduate work force in South Africa (Hayward & Ncayiyana, 2014). There is therefore a drive by the department of higher education to improve post-graduate level productivity, as this will improve the country's economic and educational profile (Dominguez-Whitehead, 2017). Albeit this important drive, there is a worrying trend that many masters students have difficulty in completing their research writing.…”