The city of Gweru, which is more or less the compass point in the centre of Zimbabwe, had been campaigning for its own university since the start of the 1990s.
In 1998, when Zimbabwe began converting teaching and technical colleges into degree-awarding institutions, Gweru Teachers’ College started enrolling students for degrees. The State University in the Midlands was then opened (later Midlands State University) on the site of the old teachers’ college in 1999.
Today, the university offers degrees across 11 faculties, ranging from agriculture, environment and natural-resources management to medicine and health sciences, via social sciences, arts and humanities and engineering and geosciences.
It is also home to four institutes, focusing on: gender; national languages; multidisciplinary research; and public policy and devolution.
Students are encouraged to live in halls of residence, which the university describes as “home away from home”. Hall activities include formal dances, guest dinners, braai parties, aerobics and video clubs. Students organise community-service activities, such as visiting a retirement home or painting a hospital children’s ward. Hall wardens and subwardens provide academic, social and financial counselling.
