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27 August 2018 Photo Barend Nagel
WomenOfKovsies Prof LenkaBula foresees transformation at UFS
Vice-Rector: Institutional Change, Student Affairs, and Community Engagement, Prof Puleng LenkaBula, takes the lead in transforming Student Experiences at the UFS.

“It’s important to think about transformation in ways that are responsive to the challenges which students have raised,” said Prof Puleng LenkaBula. She thinks of transformation as constitutive of deliberative processes, actions, reflections, writings, and literary expressions aimed as a response to the ecological, economic, political, and social context and questions which undergird the learning, research, and engagement of UFS students, staff, and stakeholders.

Prof LenkaBula is Vice-Rector: Institutional Change, Student Affairs, and Community Engagement at the University of the Free State (UFS). 

Committed to knowledge production, novelty, and the advancement of socio-economic development in South Africa, Prof LenkaBula assumes position as work-stream leader for Student Experience in the Integrated Transformation Plan (ITP). The plan aims to identify areas of transformation that the UFS marks to revolutionise and implement in its pursuit of delivering quality graduates who will be able to contest in a global realm of competitors.

Importance of revolutionising Student Experience at the UFS

“My job is to ensure that students flourish academically and are cultivated holistically as human beings who bring embodied knowledge and experiences which will enable them to succeed in life,” detailed Prof LenkaBula. 

She also contributes towards change in the Engaged Scholarship as well as the Names, Symbols and Spaces work streams of the ITP. Prof LenkaBula has been deemed powerful in her ability to traverse disciplinary parameters, research, stakeholder cultivation, and development.

“It is important to navigate symbols and spaces as a co-aspect of Student Experience to enrich the diversity of know-hows at the UFS and map a university that will represent a value-system that prioritises inclusivity and diversity,” urged Prof LenkaBula with reference to the significance of her role in the implementation of the ITP. 
 
ITP deemed an integral mechanism of growth for Kovsies


Ensuring that UFS graduates are locally adept, knowledgeable, active, and globally competitive in imperative areas of interest, highlights the general importance of the ITP for Prof LenkaBula.

The Vice-Rector underlined that the UFS has had historical challenges within its existence which have demonstrated a need for change that promotes dignity for all and respect for the diversity of its people, in an effort to secure social cohesion.

“Open dialogue and participation are mechanisms that the university needs to make use of to engage the past in order to create constructive directions for the future,” said Prof LenkaBula.

She concluded by stating that the UFS is a key global resource, as we live in a state of economic globalisation. “Knowledge is an essential imperative in knowledge-economies that breed skilled labour, and the ability to think critically in order to formulate ideas that will change the world”, said Prof LenkaBula.

News Archive

Leadership for Change celebrates graduation ceremony
2014-10-15

The Leadership for Change Programme hosted its third annual graduation ceremony on 9 October 2014 at the Centenary Complex on the Bloemfontein Campus.

The event consisted of two segments. The first was aimed at the group who has travelled abroad during the past year. They were presented with special certificates acknowledging the work they have done during their participation in the programme.

The second element of the evening was to wish the 2014/2015 group all of the best for their upcoming travels. This group will be travelling abroad during next year. Of the 250 applicants, the top 32 students were chosen to be part of the Leadership for Change Programme.

Prof Jonathan Jansen, Vice-Chancellor and Rector, said, “I hope you came back with the capacity to distinguish right from wrong – not only through law, but morally as a leader.”

Waldo Staude, Vice-president of the Student Representative Council (SRC), acted as Chair to the evening’s proceedings. He is also an alumnus of this programme.

“This programme has made its mark as we observe the number of leadership positions our students from the programme hold on this campus,” Staude said. “We have eight Leadership for Change students in the SRC for the 2014/15 term.”

The Leadership for Change Programme each year gives first-year students exposure to top universities throughout the world. Its focus is to establish a new campus culture of student relations across boundaries.

Six cohort groups – of between five to six students each – will visit universities on three different continents in January 2015. Each group will be accompanied by a UFS staff member serving the role of mentor.

The universities they will be visiting (according to continent), are:

 USA
Cleveland State University
University of Minnesota
University of Vermont 

Europe
The Netherlands: Vrije University in Amsterdam
Belgium: University of Antwerp and Ghent University 
 
Asia
Japan: International Christian University

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