Stakeholders' University Social Responsibility Awareness and Intervention within Host Communities in English-Speaking Cameroon

Abstract

The study assessed the extent to which tertiary education institutions stakeholders are aware and have been up to the task in fulfilling their social responsibility interventions on Host communities within the English-Speaking regions of Cameroon. Two research questions were answered and two hypotheses tested. The research adopted the evaluative and sample survey research designs, using both quantitative and qualitative approaches (Higher Education Institution/Host Community Stakeholders’ Questionnaire –HEI/HCS-Q and a focus group discussion guide) to collect data from stratified and purposively sampled 630 joined higher education stakeholders from the two English-speaking regions of Cameroon. After employing descriptive and inferential statistics (frequencies, percentages, and chi-square statistics) for data analysis, the findings of this study on a whole revealed the followings: 58% stakeholders expressed awareness of university social responsibility within host communities as opposed to 42% who are and were unaware. The null hypothesis was therefore rejected as there was a significant relationships between higher education stakeholders and their awareness level of university social responsibility on their host communities (X2(9, N = 600) = 92.95, p = 0.000). 63.1% of stakeholders were of the opinion that higher education institutions do not offer free university education to qualified but socially marginalized students from their host communities as against 36.9% of stakeholders who agreed. The null hypothesis was rejected as there was a significant relationship between higher education institutions and stakeholders opinions on the extent to which free University education is offered to qualified but socially marginalised members of host communities (X2 (4, N = 600) = 65.55, p = 0.000). The fundamental recommendation was on the need for intentional concrete policy measures within Cameroon’s current decentralization adventure to create increased awareness, fully introduce and guide the practice of University social responsibility interventions by higher education institutions on their host communities.