What you can study at South Africa’s three big private universities

Prospective South African students looking for tertiary education outside of public institutions can study for a wide range of degrees, diplomas, and certificates from private universities or colleges.

These institutions also provide an alternative for those who did not receive admission to certain programmes at their preferred university despite meeting the minimum criteria.

There are currently three major options to choose from, although your language proficiency might limit you to two of them.

The oldest and largest major private tertiary higher education company is the Independent Institute of Education’s Varsity College, founded in 1991.

It is part of the AdvTech private education group and offers over 57 accredited qualifications across eight campuses and distance learning centres.

South Africa’s biggest private school group — Curro Holdings — founded private tertiary education company Stadio in 2016.

The institution was formed out of Curro’s 2013 acquisition of Embury.

In 2017, Stadio was spun off from Curro Holdings and listed separately on the JSE with anchor shareholder PSG Alpha Investments.

The company subsequently acquired several other registered smaller higher education businesses — including AFDA, CA Connect, Milpark Education, LISOF, Prestige Academy and Southern Business School.

That is why it is able to offer over 50 qualifications from six contact learning campuses and six distance learning campuses and centres.

Akademia is technically the youngest option of the three and the only one that offers courses in a language other than English.

The Solidarity-owned university, founded in 2011, offers 12 degrees and a range of diplomas and higher certificates, with Afrikaans as the medium of instruction.

Its founding came in response to many public universities ending Afrikaans-based learning.

Solidarity has two full-time contact learning campuses in Centurion and plans to roll out a third in the Western Cape by 2026.

It also boasts two residences for full-time students and plans to complete the construction of a larger campus in Pretoria East by 2027.

For part-time distance learning, it has an additional five study centres.

Between 2012 and 2022, Akademia grew its student intake from forty to 2,350 and its staff from five to nearly 200.

MyBroadband assembled all the degrees, diplomas, higher certificates, and certificates offered by these three universities.

The table below summarises the qualifications offered by Akademia, Stadio, and Varsity College.