Universities and schools
The DRC has dozens of faculties and departments of public and private universities dedicated to training in communication and journalism. They have qualified and competent, but very poorly paid teachers, as for most of the agents and civil servants of the State, and who are in very small numbers in relation to the demand. The country has more or less 3,000 teachers with less than 500 dedicated to teach communication and journalism for all the universities in all its 26 provinces. The fact that they are also very poorly paid (less than 1,500 dollars for the ordinary teacher) pushes them to seek complementary jobs, especially through other universities (especially private). This situation strongly affects the quality of the teaching provided by teachers who are unmotivated and who cannot give the best of themselves. These faculties and departments of communication and journalism also have libraries, which are unfortunately not up to date. Internet connection is not ensured within these faculties and departments because overall they don’t have sufficient financial means for their operations. The lack of motivation of teachers, the lack of equipment and didactic materials also affects the quality of the training that students receive, which is not competitive compared with what their colleagues in other countries receive. New technologies are not taught in a practical way in the faculties of communication and journalism. These faculties lack teaching materials and the students do not perform practical exercises. Moreover, teachers are poorly trained on new technologies. The fact that many lessons are purely theoretical does not give the finalists the opportunity to present themselves as well-trained technicians. And this weakness of training negatively affects their subsequent professional benefits.
The most important Journalism and Communication Science courses are available at:
- Institut Facultaire des Sciences de l’Information et de la Communication (IFASIC). This one is the most specialised in journalism training.
- Université catholique du Congo (UCC)
- Université de Kinshasa (UNIKIN)
- Université Evangélique en Afrique (UEA)
- Université Libre des Pays des Grands Lacs (ULPGL)
- Université Officielle de Bukavu (UOB)
- Université protestante au Congo (UPC)