Patience Mukwambo holds an MSc in Population Studies from the University of Zimbabwe and a PhD in Development Studies from the University of the Free State. She has been involved in several research projects designing questionnaires, collecting and analysing data, and report writing. The research projects have focused on higher education access, aspirations and opportunities in Zimbabwe and South Africa. Her research interests include human development, higher education, access, teaching and learning, and quality. She has also taught graduate and postgraduate courses at the University of Zimbabwe and the University of the Free State.
Patience is a full-time researcher in the SARCHI Chair in Higher Education and Human Development Research Group at the University of the Free State, South Africa, on the Miratho project. The Miratho project aims to investigate the interacting and complex biographical, socioeconomic, policy, and educational factors that enable or inhibit pathways for rural and township youth to get in, get on, and get out of higher education, in terms of ‘learning outcomes’ achieved.
Her 2019 book, Quality in Higher Education as a Tool for Human Development: Enhancing Teaching and Learning in Zimbabwe (published by Routledge) is a product of her doctoral research. Using Zimbabwe as a case study, this book innovatively proposes an alternative way of theorising the quality of teaching and learning in higher education from a human development perspective.
Recent publications by Patience include:
i. Mukwambo, P. 2019. Policy and practice disjunctures: Quality teaching and learning in Zimbabwean higher education. Studies in higher education. https://doi:10.1080/03075079.2019.1596075.
ii. Mkwananzi, F. and Mukwambo, P. 2019. Widening participation in higher education for marginalised migrant youth through flexible teaching and learning mechanisms. Widening participation and lifelong learning, 21(2), pp. 100-119. https://doi.org/10.5456/WPLL.21.2.100.
iii. Mukwambo, P. 2019. Human Development and perceptions on the relevance of secondary education in rural Africa: A Zimbabwean case study. Compare: A journal of international and comparative education. (forthcoming)