Acute shortage of professors at the country’s private universities is posing a threat to quality education. Almost all the private universities are being run mostly by lecturers, claimed concerned sources. As most of the private universities lack adequate number of professors excepting a few part time teachers, growing number of students are being deprived of teaching of experienced and skilled teachers. A recent report of the University Grants Commission also said that the academic activities of the country’s most of the private universities are being carried out by lecturers.
Teachers having PhD degrees are very rare without a few top private universities, the report mentioned. The 45th annual UGC report said, some 92 private universities have 16,074 teachers, of whom 11,722 are full-time and 4,352 part-time. Of the full-time teachers, only 835 are professors, 736 associate professors, 2,870 assistant professors, 7,051 lecturers and 185 others. Among the part-time teachers, there are 1,312 professors, 644 associate professors, 788 assistant professors, 1,401 lecturers and 207 others.
It is found out that private universities are mainly run by lecturers. Most of the full-time professors are teaching in the big four to five private universities. The rest of the universities are mainly run by three or four professors. Even the number of part-time professors is much higher than full-time professors at these universities. As a result, students are being deprived of the teaching of skilled teachers. According to section 35 (1) of the Private Universities Act 2010, the number of part-time teachers in each department or programme of a private university shall not exceed one-third of the full-time teachers. This law is not accepted by most universities in terms of professors, associate professors and assistant professors.
There were 4,722 women teachers in private universities in the year 2018. Of them, 3,981 were full-time, and 741 were part-time. According to the UGC report, there were no permanent professors at many universities in the year 2018. There are also a large number of universities being run by two or three professors. In that year there were no permanent professors at Bangladesh University, East Delta University, Sheikh Fazilatunnesa Mujib University, Cox's Bazar International University, Global University Bangladesh and University of Global Village.
According to the report, the average ratio of teachers and students at private universities was 1:30. However, the University of Science and Technology, Chittagong had 1:85 and the University of Information Technology and Sciences had 1:66. The report stated that the total number of PhD teachers in private universities in the year 2018 was 3,120. The highest number of PhD teachers was in North South University with 418. In addition, there were 173 PhD teachers in Independent University, Bangladesh and BRAC University, and 152 PhD teachers in East West University.
Sheikh Kabir Hossain, chairman of the Bangladesh Private University Association, said, ‘We always tell the universities to comply with the law. In many universities, the number of students is low, so they cannot retain more professors. But we have no government support. With the help of the government in some cases, we can go for improving the situation.’