Why Bangladesh need a Semi-public university?

There are numerous universities in the world today that are both privately sponsored and publicly funded. Their popularity is on the rise as well as they are often seen in QS rankings. The University of Rabat, the University of Delaware, the University of Pennsylvania,  Lincoln University along with Oxford. 

Semi-Public or Semi-Private both are the same thing. What Are Public and Private Universities? Public colleges and universities are higher education institutions that are mainly funded by state governments. In contrast, private colleges and universities rely more heavily on student tuition fees, alumni donations, and endowments to fund their academic programs. 

A new type of PUBLIC-PRIVATE UNIVERSITY theory has been discovered in the present world. Generally, these universities are found in Germany but there are precedents in other countries of the world as well. All these universities have tuition fees, alumni donations as well as government subsidies in the research sector. The US government invests heavily in the research sector at world-class private universities such as Harvard, Stanford, and MIT. However, they are not directly called semi-public universities as they collect most of the money themselves. 

An Irish expert on a tour of South Asia said, South Asian countries need Public-private (Semi Public) universities more than public universities.

There are specific reasons for saying this because there is no end to corruption in both public and private universities in most South Asian countries. Even though the government pours a lot of money into public universities, the high-ranking officials of the universities embezzle the money through corruption and some started living abroad in the name of Ph.D. degrees.

There are very few instances of misappropriation of funds in private universities but different types of fraud and corruption are practiced in such universities. Some private universities sell certificates in exchange for money and even collect more money through corruption by showing different fees to students. Although those corrupted works are also seen in public universities but less.

To get rid of all these, many countries of the world are taking the project of creating this new type of university. In semi-public universities, the government will add a certain amount to the university fund every year for research and improvement of the quality of the university. At the same time, not much from ordinary students but a small amount of tuition fee and alumni donations as well as a certain amount from sponsored organizations will be added to the fund. This will increase the amount of cash in the fund and will help to provide world-class education.

Even this will not create any conflict between public and private universities. The government will keep an eye on improving the quality of the university every year. If there is any kind of corruption within the university, the government will order the university authorities to resolve it as soon as possible or they'll cut the donations to fund. At the same time, if the government official tries to steal money from the fund, the private sector will also respond to the country’s Anti-corruption unit.

The sad thing is that although there are semi-public schools and colleges in Bangladesh but there are no semi-public universities. Many years ago there was a rumor in government circles to make Ahsanullah University of Science and Technology a semi-public university, but it remains a rumor.

In fact, if this decision was taken, it would have been the best decision ever made in the education sector of Bangladesh. AUST is progressing so rapidly and they deserve it. I think there should be at least one semi-public university in the country to balance the education and research sectors.