Cornelius Hagenmeier

Cornelius Hagenmeier is an international education administrator and legal academic, rooted in the German and South African jurisdictions. He was born in Darmstadt, Germany on 15 June 1971. He obtained his qualification to be appointable as a judge in Germany (assessor juris) before he decided to settle in South Africa in 2002. He holds South African LLB (UNISA) and LLM degrees (UCT) and is a non-practising attorney of the High Court of South Africa. He serves in a voluntary capacity on the Board of the African Centre for Higher Education Internationalisation (AfriC). From 2015 to 2018, he was treasurer and member of the Executive Committee of the International Education Association of South Africa (IEASA). In addition to his managerial, administrative, and legal skills, he has extensive expertise in international higher-education partnerships and internationalisation strategy development. He has taught various short learning programmes in this field and facilitated relevant workshops. 

Hagenmeier held the position of Director of the Office of International Affairs at the University of the Free State from 2017 until July 2023. Throughout this period, he served as the coordinator for the iKudu project. Dr. Hagenmeier is currently the 'Referent Internationalisierung' at the Mittweida University of Applied Sciences in Germany, where he is responsible for promoting internationalisation. He remains a Research Fellow of the University of the Free State.

Lynette Jacobs

Lynette Jacobs is a Comparative and International Education scholar at the University of the Free State, and the Research Portfolio Lead in the university’s Office for International Affairs. She is also an NRF-rated researcher. Her own research, which has evolved from post-positivist to post-qualitative, focuses on marginality and inclusivity at an individual and systemic level, and on ways to overcome barriers within education systems. Her current research focuses on inclusive internationalisation of higher education.  She is one of the work-group leaders in the iKudu project (co-funded by the European Commission Erasmus+ Programme), which seeks to develop capacity for curriculum transformation through internationalisation and development of COIL. She has successfully supervised 30 postgraduate students from diverse countries, including the USA, China, Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, and Ethiopia.  She has taught research methodology and CIE at undergraduate and postgraduate level and has been involved in mentoring young researchers for more than a decade.

Since August 2023, Lynette Jacobs has been serving as the interim Director of the Office for International Affairs. She also acts as the institutional coordinator for the iKudu project, overseeing its implementation and progress.

Chevon Slambee

 Chevon Slambee is the project manager of the iKudu project and has been working in the higher education sector since May 2004.

She has been working in the higher education sector since May 2004. She first started her career in the Faculty of Education at the University of Fort Hare, where she was a key stakeholder in the accreditation of the master’s by dissertation qualification. 

Slambee holds a Bachelor of Social Sciences degree with majors in Psychology and Industrial Sociology from Rhodes University and an Honours degree in Sociology (cum laude) from the University of the Free State.

She currently occupies the position of Chief Officer at the University of the Free State, responsible for Strategic Projects, Institutional Reporting, and Research Internationalisation. Through this portfolio, she aims to highlight the importance of internationalisation in enhancing the quality and societal relevance of research and education. She will be responsible for the project management of the iKudu project.

Jos Beelen

Jos Beelen is Professor of Global Learning and Co-Director of the Centre for Global and Inclusive Learning at The Hague University of Applied Sciences. He is a Visiting Professor at Coventry University and at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. Dr Beelen leads a research group that explores internationalisation at home, particularly the skills of lecturers to develop and teach internationalised curricula. Action research is a key method for this research theme. Another research theme is the continuum of internationalisation – from primary to tertiary education. He has published a range of articles on the implementation of internationalisation at home, both from educational, organisational, and systemic perspectives. 

Dr Beelen is a member of the General Council and a senior trainer for the European Association for International Education (EAIE). He was the recipient of the 2018 President’s Award from that association for his contribution to internationalisation at home. 

Jos Beelen and Lynette Jacobs jointly led Working Group 1 (WG1) within the iKudu project, focusing on advancing the internationalisation of curriculum imperatives.

Eva Haug

Eva Haug is Educational Adviser for Curriculum Internationalisation and COIL/VE and Senior Lecturer: Intercultural Competence at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences (AUAS). She is also a steering group member of the EAIE (European Association for International Education) Internationalisation at Home expert community. As of 2023, Haug is a research fellow at the University of the Free State in South Africa. She is also an affiliated trainer at Florida International University, where she provides COIL workshops in English and Spanish.

As educational adviser, she provides professional development for academics and staff regarding internationalisation of the curriculum and online collaboration. Haug has built a sustainable COIL practice at the AUAS, offering thousands of students the opportunity to experience international teamwork by pairing students from Amsterdam with students from all over the world. She has presented at conferences around the world on COIL and is regularly invited by universities to provide professional development for COIL and IoC.

Eva Haug oversaw Working Group 2 (WG2), which concentrated on planning, developing, and implementing COIL virtual exchanges within the iKudu project. The group also provided professional development opportunities aimed at enhancing COIL coordination and implementation among consortium partners.

Tiana van der Merwe

Tiana van der Merwe is the Deputy Director of the Centre for Teaching and Learning.  She holds a master’s degree in Industrial Psychology (NWU) as well as a master’s degree in Higher Education (cum laude) (UFS). Her career in higher education started as an instructional designer and educational technologist and evolved into a management and leadership role within the UFS. She is currently responsible for the coordination and implementation of the newly established Blended Learning and Innovation Support Service (BLISS) team.  The aim of BLISS is to provide institutional, multi-campus support to staff and students towards blended and online learning at the UFS.  BLISS services include academic staff development; learning and curriculum design; online assessment; multimedia content development and production; student technology training and support; as well as learning and emerging technology. 

Tiana's role in the iKudu project involved advocating for and assisting academics in implementing Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) initiatives at UFS.

Johann Moller

Johann Möller served as the Director of the IDEAS Lab, which comprises instructional designers, graphics designers, and a video crew dedicated to producing online study materials and learning artifacts. In his role for the iKudu project, Möller supervised the creation of learning artifacts and online modules as needed. Additionally, he was nominated from UFS as a member of Working Group 2 and contributed to the development of learning artifacts to promote Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) across institutions. He left the employ of the UFS in December 2022. 

Nooreen Adam

Nooreen Adam has been the project's administrator since August 2020. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Information Technology from the University of the Free State. 
Currently, she serves as an Officer in the International Office at the University of the Free State, working under the portfolio responsible for Strategic Projects, Institutional Reporting, and Research Internationalisation.