Peace Education: A Panacea for Quality Assurance in Higher Education in Africa

Abstract

To ensure that quality assurance is achieved in higher education goes beyond the provision of human and material resources. This is because the environment in which higher institutions of learning are operating are characterised by various intensities of conflicts. This development has made the achievement of quality and quality assurance in higher education a mere official-dream in Africa. Based on this, peace education is advocated as a means through which these challenges can be surmounted. Peace education is holistic in nature and it possesses the capacity to positively influence the physical and spiritual lives of people for the cultivation of peaceful behaviour in a society. Peace education is anchored on the philosophy that teaches non-violence, equity, trust, compassion, cooperation, justice,
love and respect for people. It is a social practice that reorientates and modifies unacceptable behaviour through the impartation of skills, knowledge and attitudes needed for effective empowerment of people for constructive social change. The operations of peace education in tertiary institutions will foster a serene climate where institutional administrators, teaching and non-teaching staff including students will compatibly work together to achieve set goals. Therefore, the effective propagation of peace education programmes in higher institutions of learning will aid in achieving quality and its sustenance in Africa. To achieve the objective of the study, the following thematic areas were explored: goals of higher education and quality assurance issue; nature, causes and effects of conflict in higher education; peace education and its potency to transform higher education and peace education and quality assurance in higher education in Africa.