Trails in Academic and Administrative Leadership in Kenya

Authors

Ratemo Waya Michieka
Professor of Agriculture at the University of Nairobi, Kenya.

Keywords:

Trails, Academic and Administrative Leadership, scholars, freedom, university

Synopsis

CODESRIA, Dakar, 2016, 320p., ISBN: 978-2-86978-642-4

Scholars, especially those interested in understanding how leadership has inhibited academic freedom and hindered effectiveness of institutions of higher learning have for long been engaged by the very important manner in which governance and leadership of higher education institutions in Africa is constituted and managed. The fact that there has been a dearth of work based on the experiences of those who have served as university leaders has created a major gap. Questions remain on how leaders of higher education institutions are identified, how they are prepared, the personal predispositions that individuals bring to the exercise of such positions and their personal experiences regarding what energizes or inhibits the performance of their work. Until recently, presidents in most African countries served as chancellors of public universities, identification of those who served as university leaders was largely a political process. But much has changed, with most countries establishing oversight bodies and the overall governance of higher education institutions divorced from the day-to-day political processes. Trails in Academic and Administrative Leadership in Kenya provides a personal account of the experiences in higher education leadership from an individual whose tenure in leadership straddled the two eras. In this book, Prof. Michieka provides an account of how his early education prepared him for roles in academic and institutional leadership in Kenya. The author shares his experiences on the trails he had to navigate as an academic, a vice-chancellor and a chairperson of university council at a time when universities in Kenya were transiting from extreme government administrative control to a greater degree of operational autonomy. Readers will find in this work thought-provoking insights on how leaders of higher education institutions in Kenya have had to balance between demands of the political system and the need to safeguard academic traditions in the everyday management of the institutions.

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Author Biography

Ratemo Waya Michieka, Professor of Agriculture at the University of Nairobi, Kenya.

Ratemo Waya Michieka is a Professor of Agriculture at the University of Nairobi, Kenya. Born in 1950, he had his primary and secondary school education in Kenya before proceeding to Rutgers University in the USA for his BSc degree in agriculture and environmental sciences, an MSc in vocational technical education and eventually a PhD in 1978. He did his post-doctoral research at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Nigeria, before joining the College of Agriculture and Veterinary Sciences at the University of Nairobi, where he rose through the academic and administrative ranks to become professor and founding Vice-Chancellor of the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology. He has published widely in local and international journals, and he is the author of three books including one on the taxonomy of East African Weeds. Prof. Michieka is currently the Chairperson of Council of Kenyatta University, in addition to his research and teaching duties as professor at the University of Nairobi.

References

Animal Farm, George Orwell, 1945 13. Around the world in Eighty Days, Jules Verne, 1872. Degrees that are of little value, The Standard Xtra, July 8, 2013, page 1.

Did the British send Kisii Worrier’s Head to London? Daily Nation, October 14, 2013. page 8.

Environmental Degradation and Pollution: Let us Reverse the Trends, Inaugural Lecture, Ratemo Michieka, 2004.

Integrity is about paying the price for doing what is right, not what is legal, Warah, Rasna, Daily Nation, February 25, 2013, page12.

Parents Lobby wants review of varsity exams, The Standard on Sunday, December 15, 2013,page 22.

Roaches shun sugary bait in adaptive survival tactics, The Standard, June 14, 2013, page 7. The Commencement Controversy, The New York Times, May 12, 2013, page 4

The Leadership Book, Charles J, Keating, 1982. Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe, 1958. Varsity expansion must consider quality safeguards, The Standard,May 15, 2013, page 18.

Will Cockroaches Find Another Survival Trick: Laying Off the Sweets. The New York Times, May 24, 2013. page A 13.

World Bank Survey shows how teachers abscond classes, the Standard, July 20, 2013, page 6.

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Published

February 18, 2016

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