University of Liberia Seeks $61.6M as Enrollment Doubles Capacity

Published: October 7, 2026

University of Liberia President Layli Maparyan presented a $61.6 million funding request for 2027, citing overcrowding, infrastructure needs and unresolved staff pay and promotion concerns.

MONROVIA – The University of Liberia, holding about 30,000 students on a campus built for 15,000, is asking the government for $61.6 million to fund its 2027 priorities, President Dr. Layli Maparyan told a Finance Ministry budget hearing on Tuesday.

Maparyan put the plan’s cost at $61,614,970. The list covers more renovations and new classrooms, as well as fixes to long-running pay and promotion grievances among faculty and staff.

By Lennart Dodoo

“UL campus was built for 15,000 students and we now have about 30,000,” Maparyan said. “We need a bigger campus, we need more classrooms, we need more space.”

She said a classroom building the university intended to build this year was not built “due to shifting priorities,” and that she hopes it can go up next year.

Maparyan also said a recent audit by the General Auditing Commission found the university had kept on staff who should have been retired under the law.

“The University of Liberia accumulated many, many individuals who should have been retired according to legislation and have not been,” she said. “We’re now in the uncomfortable process of having to deal with that.”

She said a hostel at the Fendall campus was handed over in March 2025 but has sat empty because the university never furnished it.

“We could have been raising money all that time if we had just furnished it,” she said.

Maparyan said the top concern of faculty and staff is fixing pay and promotions. That includes promoting faculty who returned from study leave, correcting pay disparities among lower-paid staff and honoring increments faculty say they are owed. She said the university also wants new policies to cap the cost of adjunct lecturers and the number of staff who go on study leave, along with merit-based promotions.

Maparyan said the university wants to cut the time students take to graduate.

“We cannot be a school that has people in school for eight to ten years,” she said. The goal is four to six years, and the university will move to continuous academic semesters.

Maparyan said the university aims to be among Africa’s top 300 universities under the government’s ARREST Agenda, but that the most respected international rankings do not rank it at all.

She said the government’s $6.35 million allocation this year is for renovating the Graduate School and Business College buildings on Capitol Hill and the medical school’s academic building in Congo Town. The Law School and the Sinje campus are next. Her 2027 list adds the main administrative building at Fendall, the science and engineering buildings, the agriculture campus, a perimeter fence around Capitol Hill, and new furniture. The university also proposes a 10-megawatt solar plant at Fendall through a public-private partnership.

The Finance Ministry official chairing the hearing said renovation funding would continue, but that the university is competing with other agencies’ requests. He told Maparyan the university should reinstate its honor roll without waiting for money.

“This, we don’t need budget or media approval. Just do it,” he said.