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This chapter offers a survey of education development in Sub-Saharan Africa, dynamics of global forces and Sub-Saharan African context. First, the regional context of Sub-Saharan Africa is surveyed. This is followed first by an overview of the incoming tide of global forces impinging on education in the sub-continent, followed by a discussion of education developments in Sub-Saharan Africa as co-shaped by contextual contours. It transpires that the contextual realities of sub-Sahara Africa not only have a powerful mediating role on the impact of global forces but also are in their own right an agency in shaping the education response of societies in the region. The other common thread running through the chapter is the lack of knowledge explicating the interrelationship between education and societal context in the region. This lacunus is evident from the fact that no country in the region has ever been included in international surveys such as the TALIS survey, to lack of research on, for example, informal settlements or the informal economy and its intersection with education. Such research, when placed on the Comparative and International Education research agenda, will not only be of significance to Sub-Sahara Africa, but also to the entire world, many aspects of the contextual architecture of the region are becoming increasingly evident world-wide.

This paper presents a state-of-the-field review of progress toward the ideal of Education for All in the Sub-Saharan Africa region. First, the significance of Education for All in Sub-Saharan Africa is clarified. Then, the beginnings of formal education in Sub-Saharan Africa (i.e., nineteenth century missionary education) are discussed, followed by colonial education. This is followed by an overview of post-independence strategies and initiatives aimed at the expansion of education. The Outline of a Plan for African Educational Development, drafted by a meeting of Ministers of Education of African states (MINEDAF) immediately after independence, 1961, is discussed, followed by the resolutions taken at the seven MINEDAF conferences held since 1961 till the present day. The resulting strategies and initiatives aimed at bringing education to all are discussed and evaluated. The impact of structural adjustment programs signed in recent years by most governments of African countries with the World Bank is also addressed. In conclusion, the present state of education in Sub-Saharan Africa and the prospects and challenges of Education for All are summarized.

This chapter explores the perceptions that custodians of African cultures such as parents, grand-parents, village chiefs, and other community leaders hold regarding what higher education institutions ought to achieve for their children, and the extent to which these final ends are being, or can be, achieved through teaching and learning in cyberspace. Using the African context of Botswana as a reference point, the chapter situates learning and teaching practices online in the context of culture. After exploring the literature on cultural worldviews, African expectations of higher education, and online pedagogy and technology, the chapter documents the understandings and perceptions of the final ends that higher education institutions ought to pursue held by 39 village chiefs, community leaders, and parents from different cultural groups and communities. Evidence from phenomenological interviews revealed that Africans held that Afro-communal purposes for higher education in which promoting virtue, supporting culture, facilitating cooperation, and contributing to socio-economic development were seen as the paramount final ends for higher education institutions. The findings support Metz’s (2019) theoretical model of the ends of African higher education institutions. The chapter argues that, for online pedagogy in African universities and colleges to be successful, it should be grounded in collectivism where emphasis is given to the use of synchronous communication systems for the delivery of learning experiences, pedagogical practices are framed within community of practice, students are exposed to education for morality to foster a deeper sense of being real humans, and a socio-economic development agenda is emphasised.

Virtually, all countries in sub-Saharan Africa (perhaps with the exception of South Africa) have still not achieved the economic, social and political self-sufficiency that the pioneers of decolonization had envisaged by the closing years of the millennium. Despite the active presence of the World Bank (WB) and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) on the sub-region development scene, initial gains immediately after colonial rule have disappeared, resulting in economic and social stagnation and, in extreme cases, disintegration (Sierra Leone, Democratic Republic of Congo and Liberia). According to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) (1996, 2000) in many post-colonial countries, real per capita Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has fallen and welfare gains achieved since independence in areas like food consumption, health and education have declined. As a whole, in sub-Saharan Africa, per capita incomes dropped by 21% in real terms between 1981 and 1989.¹ Madagascar and Mali now have per capita incomes of $799 and $753, down from $1,258 and $898 twenty-five years ago. In 16 other sub-Saharan countries per capita incomes were also lower in 1999 than in 1975.² Nearly one-quarter of the world's population, but nearly 42% of the population of sub-Saharan Africa, live on less than $1 a day. Levels of inequality have also increased dramatically worldwide. This phenomenon is vividly reflected in the well-known graphic presentation of the UNDP (1992) in Fig. 1.

This paper aims to investigate entrepreneurship course offerings in business administration/management curricula in sub‐Saharan higher education institutions.

The authors conducted a survey of online course catalogs to analyze entrepreneurship course offerings.

The results of the study demonstrate that most higher education institutions in the sample offer courses in entrepreneurship and/or small business management but few offer specialization in the area. Newly created institutions are more likely to offer entrepreneurship courses and specializations than traditional ones while a few operate university‐based entrepreneurship centers. The study findings are consistent with the environmental school of entrepreneurial thought.

The study depended exclusively on online data. Several institutions were excluded from the sample because their web sites were unavailable. Future research should use a larger sample.

The paper will assist researchers, practitioners, policymakers, and other stakeholders in higher education in strengthening the discussion about enterprise and entrepreneurship education in sub‐Saharan business programmes.

This is the first study on the content of entrepreneurship courses in sub‐Saharan African Universities.

Over the past 65 years, Sub-Saharan Africa has been the terrain of the biggest education expansion drive in human history (Wolhuter & Van Niekerk, 2009). On top of this expansion, Africa has been the site of imaginative experiments and innovations in education (Samoff & Carrol, 2013, p. 403). These all seem to offer attractive and fertile ground for Comparative and International Education scholarship to flourish. This chapter surveys the historical development and current presence of various facets of the scholarly field of Comparative and International Education in Sub-Saharan Africa. The ultimate aim is to chart a future course for the field in the context of the meteoric rise (economically, demographically, and politically) of the continent. To commence with, an overview of this context is first given. Subsequently the history of formal education and then of higher education in the region are sketched. The evolution and current state of Comparative and International Education within this context is then surveyed, concluding with a reflection on its future prospects and course.

The purpose of this study was to explore the clinical readiness of simulation-based education (SBE) in preparing nursing and midwifery students for clinical practice in sub-Saharan Africa. This study has synthesised the findings from existing research studies and provides an overview of the current state of SBE in nursing and midwifery programs in the region.

A qualitative meta-synthesis of previous studies was conducted using the following steps: developing a review question, developing and a search strategy, extracting and meta-synthesis of the themes from the literature and meta-synthesis of themes. Five databases were searched for from existing English literature (PubMed, Cumulative Index for Nursing and Allied Health Professional Literature [CINAHL], PsycINFO, EMBASE and ScienceDirect Medline, CINAHL and Science Direct), including grey literature on the subject. Eight qualitative studies conducted in sub-Saharan Africa between 2014 and 2022 were included. Hawker et al.'s framework was used to assess quality.

The following themes emerged from the literature. Theme 1: Improved skills and competencies through realism and repetition. Theme 2: Improved skills and competencies through realism and repetition. Theme 3: Improved learning through debriefing and reflection. Theme 4: Constraints of simulation as a pedagogical teaching strategy.

The qualitative meta-synthesis intended to cover articles from 2012 to 2022. Between 2012 and 2013, the authors could not identify purely qualitative studies from sub-Saharan Africa. The studies identified were either mixed methods or purely quantitative. This constitutes a study limitation.

Findings emphasise educator training in SBE. Comprehensive multidisciplinary training, complemented by expertise and planned debriefing sessions, serves as a catalyst for fostering reflective learning. Well-equipped simulation infrastructure is essential in preparing students for their professional competencies for optimal patient outcomes. Additional research is imperative to improve the implementation of SBE in sub-Saharan Africa.

The originality and value of SBE in nursing and midwifery programs in sub-Saharan Africa lie in its contextual relevance, adaptation to resource constraints, innovative teaching methodologies, provision of a safe learning environment, promotion of interprofessional collaboration and potential for research and evidence generation. These factors contribute to advancing nursing and midwifery education and improving healthcare outcomes in the region. This study fills this gap in the literature.

The African continent is filled with a textured history, vast resources, and immense opportunity. The landscape of higher education on such a diverse continent is extensive and complex. In this review of the landscape, four primary topics are evaluated. The historical context is the foundational heading, which briefly covers the evolution from colonization to independence and the knowledge economy. The second main heading builds upon the historical context to provide an overview of the numerous components of higher education, including language diversity, institutional type, and access to education. A third section outlines key challenges and opportunities including finance, governance, organizational effectiveness, and the academic core. Each of these challenges and opportunities is interconnected and moves from external influences (e.g., fiscal and political climate) to internal influences (e.g., administrative leadership and faculty roles). The last layer of the landscape focuses on leveraging higher education in Africa for social and economic progress and development. Shaping a higher education system around principles of the public good and generating social benefits is important for including postsecondary institutions in a development strategy.

When post-secondary education (PSE) in Africa is viewed in terms of growth rather than total enrolment the region tops the list of impressive trends. Between the years 1985 and 2005 the countries of sub-Saharan Africa experienced the largest growth of PSE involvement of any region with total enrolment increasing fourfold. The insatiable student demand is being met by a proliferation of large-scale and small-scale religious denominations establishing post-secondary education. The current chapter provides a categorical, multi-levelled analysis of the growth of religious providers in sub-Saharan Africa. Particular attention is given to the activities and rationales of stakeholders who play a part in the establishment and continued operations of religious PSE. Using Marginson and Rhoades’s (2002) glonacal agency heuristic, the networks between stakeholders and their varying degrees of influence on regional PSE are described and discussed. The findings suggest that PSE in the region is being widely provided by small-scale denominations establishing religious training institutions. But the influence of this PSE is mainly limited to local communities.

This chapter focuses on a study, which investigates the question: How do teacher education policies match teacher education practices in Anglophone West Africa? Teacher education policy in this chapter refers to action statements in verbal or written form made by national education authorities/agencies about teacher education, while teacher education practice refers to the work that teachers do. Using the method of research synthesis, multi-layered, purposeful sampling of various data sources, Boolean and non-Boolean search strategies, qualitative and quantitative analytical procedures, the study identified over a hundred documents. Out of these, 77 documents met the criteria for inclusion in the study. The distribution of research outcomes by Anglophone West African countries were as follows: 18.2% were on Gambia, 27.3% were on Ghana, 10.4% were on Liberia, 24.7% were on Nigeria, and 19.5% were on Sierra Leone. From this research synthesis, it is evident that there is a gap between teacher education policy and practice in Anglophone West Africa. Most teacher education policies are “add-on,” meaning that they were formulated as part of a larger national policy framework on basic, secondary and tertiary education. In addition, the research synthesis found that Gambia, Ghana, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone are very similar in terms of their pre-service teacher training models, but differ in their in-service and professional development systems, while Liberia has a slightly different in-service model with varying durations. The limitations and implications of the findings for further comparative and international education research are discussed in the chapter.