Economic Challenges and Students’ Persistence at Zimbabwe Ezekiel Guti University (ZEGU) in Zimbabwe

Using Vincent Tinto’s persistence framework and human agency perspective, we ask how economic challenges impact students’ sense of self-efficacy, their sense of belonging and students’ perception of the curriculum. In times of economic difficulties, the importance students attach to education often declines, as they fear to be examples of graduates without jobs. Zimbabwe Ezekiel Guti University’s (ZEGU) unique Christian outlook is discussed as somewhat stifling the students’ sense of belonging. Despite their initial motivation and desire to complete their university education, financial difficulties are resulting in some students deferring their studies whereas other students are balancing education and survival strategies. As agentic beings, students are strategically calculating and showing resilience to cope with the challenges through being “prisoners of hope,” transactional relationships and entrepreneurial activities.