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PERSPECTIVE article

Front. Educ.
Sec. Higher Education
Volume 10 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/feduc.2025.1460726
This article is part of the Research Topic Reshaping STEM Education: Strategies for Curriculum Decolonization and Institutional Transformation View all 12 articles

South African Audiologists need business skills to Survive: Towards a responsive curriculum

Provisionally accepted
Ben Sebothoma Ben Sebothoma *Katijah Khoza-Shangase Katijah Khoza-Shangase Nomfundo Moroe Nomfundo Moroe
  • University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    South African audiologists are struggling to find jobs after completing their compulsory government-mandated year of community service in public healthcare institutions. This is in spite of the documented inequity in audiology service provision, and capacity versus demand challenges around the ear and hearing workforce in the presence of an increasing prevalence of hearing and vestibular disorders. The high prevalence of hearing and vestibular disorders linked to various causes including the quadruple burden of disease that South Africa suffers from indicates that there is a clear need for more audiologists to be employed in various sectors in order to improve access to hearing healthcare and enhance early identification and intervention to reap the economic and quality of life benefits of preventive care. We argue for urgent curriculum reform that is responsive to the context by equipping South African audiology students with the skills to be able to successfully confront the current economic crisis.

    Keywords: Unemployment, Curriculum reform, Healthcare entrepreneurship, Audiologists, South African

    Received: 06 Jul 2024; Accepted: 06 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Sebothoma, Khoza-Shangase and Moroe. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Ben Sebothoma, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

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