The Department of Communication and Marketing has over the years received recognition for its pioneering work from national and global industry bodies. The DCM is a member to several marketing and communications associations including Marketing, Advancement and Communication in Education (Mace), the International Association for Business Communicators (IABC) and the Council for the Advancement and Support in Educatiion (CASE).
IABC Gold Quill Award of Merit: 2021 April Virtual Graduation: changes made to the 2020 Virtual Graduation Ceremony videos to improve the user experience.
IABC Africa Silver Quill Award of Excellence: "Communication Research for Narrative Building Storytelling”
MACE Bronze Award of Excellence: Deaf Awareness Month campaign 2021
IABC Gold Quill Awards of Excellence:
2020 UFS Virtual Open Day website : The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has forced us to accelerate the exploration and implementation of a web-based virtual open day experience by using innovative technologies to ensure continuous development in digitisation within the education sector.
IABC Africa Silver Quill Award of Excellence: UFS Deaf Awareness Month Campaign: The need for the campaign stemmed from various activities and endeavours by Departments SASL&DS and CUADS to provide a comprehensive, inclusive environment for deaf students or those with hearing impairments.
MACE Silver Award: UFS COVID-19 Journey: Documentary Video SeriesThe global COVID-19 pandemic resulted in major shifts in the day-to-day operations and lives of institutions and people around the world. In addition to mere reporting, we aimed to create “good news” messages with our videos by ensuring our stakeholders that we are doing all we can to keep them safe, supported, and able to continue with their work and studies.
International Gold Quill Merit Award: Gender-based violence awareness campaign photographs: In solidarity with #EndGenderBasedViolence, we commissioned a series of photographs to use on our various communication channels. As part of the campaign, we also created a URL, www.ufs.ac.za/911 with a series of emergency numbers and steps to take when reporting an incident.
CASE
(Council for the Advancement and Support of Education)
Business Issue Award: Communicating the MT Steyn Statue Review Process: The UFS Integrated Transformation Plan (ITP) shows the commitment of the UFS to widen the scope and radically accelerate transformation at the university. One of the work streams of the ITP is concerned with Names, Symbols, and Spaces. A public exhibition ensured that the review process and the statue itself remained the topic of informed intellectual conversations.
Mace Silver Award: KovsieApp communication campaign: The UFS KovsieApp Communication Campaign was aligned with two of the strategic drivers of the new Rector and Vice-Chancellor – it was a new way for students to access their personal information and receive real-time communication, especially during a crisis, from the UFS (innovation), and it encouraged our staff to embrace the change that the new app would bring (transformation).