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28 March 2018 Photo Supplied
Building programmes receive accreditation
The vision for the UFS Department of Quantity Surveying and Construction Management is to be the preferred choice for built environment students and the preferred provider of built environment graduates.
In 2017 the South African Council for the Project and Construction Management Professions (SACPCMP) visited the Department of Quantity Surveying and Construction Management at the University of the Free State (UFS), to re-accredit programmes offered by the department.

In January 2018 the department received the news that the SACPCMP granted full accreditation for the next five years (January 2018 to December 2022) for the programmes BSc Construction Management; BSc Hons Construction Management; and Master’s in Land and Property Development Management (Project Management specialisation).

The South African Council for Property Valuation Profession (SACPVP) also granted conditional accreditation for the Master’s in Land and Property Development Management (MLPM) (valuation specialisation) programme.

The value of accreditation
According to Prof Kahilu Kajimo-Shakantu, Head of the Department of Quantity Surveying and Construction Management, it means the department is recognised as a certified place of learning offering a certified programme mix recognised by the SACPCMP as meeting its standards. It further means that the department, via its programmes, is able to produce graduates who are “fit for purpose”, technically competent, and have developed and can demonstrate a range of skills.

She added: “Having accredited programmes makes our programmes attractive, with wider employment opportunities. It certifies that our graduates from the Construction Management programme are qualified and competent. They have achieved a minimum level of competence to embark on the journey to practise professionally.”

Achieving and maintaining programme accreditation from the respective national and international professional bodies is the ultimate goal for the department. “This hallmark of quality reflects the university’s aspiration towards excellence,” Prof Kajimo-Shakantu said.

On offer at the department
The department offers BSc in Construction Management and BSc Hons in Construction Management and BSc Quantity Surveying and BSc Hons Quantity Surveying respectively.  These programmes are offered both on residential (full time) as well as via compact mode of delivery (block sessions) for those already working in the construction industry but who wish to obtain or further their educational qualifications. 

At master’s level, the department offers a structured Master of Land and Property Development Management Programme (MLPM) with specialisation in either Valuation or Project Management. Other programmes on offer are the following   master’s and doctoral programmes, namely; MSc Construction Management, MSc Property Science and MSc Quantity Surveying and PhD Construction Management, PhD Property Science and PhD Quantity Surveying respectively.

“My vision for the Department of Quantity Surveying and Construction Management is to be the preferred choice for built environment students and the preferred provider of built environment graduates,” said Prof Kajimo-Shakantu.

“Construction Management programmes, like the other programmes we offer, lead to exciting, challenging and rewarding careers in the construction industry and beyond. Our graduates are also highly sought-after by built environment employers nationally and internationally,” she concluded.

News Archive

Lecture by Judge Albie Sachs: ‘Sites of memory, sites of conscience’
2015-03-23

Judge Albie Sachs

Human rights activist and former Constitutional Court Judge, Albie Sachs, will deliver a public lecture on the Bloemfontein Campus. The topic of his discussion will be ‘Sites of memory, sites of conscience’. This lecture will form part of a series that focuses on how the creative arts represent trauma and memory – and how these representations may ultimately pave the way to healing historical wounds.

The details of the event are:
Date: Thursday 26 March 2015
Time: 12:30
Venue: Albert Wessels Auditorium, Bloemfontein Campus
RSVP: Jo-Anne Naidoo at Naidooja@ufs.ac.za
A South African Sign Language interpreter will be present at the event.

Joining Judge Sachs on stage as respondent will be Dr Buhle Zuma, a young scholar and lecturer at the University of Cape Town's Psychology Department.

Expressing experiences of trauma
Judge Sachs is no stranger to the use of the arts as a way of expressing the inarticulable and overwhelming experiences of trauma. Targeted as an anti-apartheid freedom fighter, he lost his right arm and was blinded in one eye in a car bomb attack in 1988. As a judge of the Constitutional Court, he spearheaded conversations about the role of the arts in our constitutional democracy. This has led to the installation of some of the best artworks by South African artists at the Constitutional Court.

Vice-Chancellor’s Lecture Series on Trauma, Memory, and Representations of the Past
This lecture will launch of the Vice Chancellor’s Lecture Series on Trauma, Memory and Representations of the Past. It forms part of a five-year research project led by Prof Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, funded by the Mellon Foundation. The event is hosted by the UFS Trauma, Forgiveness and Reconciliation Studies.

“One of the most remarkable aspects of trauma,” Prof Gobodo-Madikizela says, “is the loss of language, a moment of rupture that produces what some scholars have referred to as ‘speechless terror’. The arts, in all its forms – literary, performance, and visual – are a viable mechanism through which the unspeakable, traumatic past may be represented.”

These artistic forms of representing trauma are at the heart of this Vice-Chancellor’s Lecture Series. “We are interested not only in how experiences that transcend language are represented through the arts,” Prof Gobodo-Madikizela explains, “but also in probing the limits of trauma theory, and how the creative arts might be employed to bear witness in a way that may open up the possibility of healing.”

Dr Buhle Zuma
Former Mandela Rhodes scholar and one of the 2011 Mail & Guardian’s 200 Young South Africans, Dr Zuma is particularly interested in issues at the heart of our rainbow nation. His current research revolves around the question of freedom: what it means to be human for black people after centuries of dehumanisation, and the role of desire and fantasy in the political imagination of post-apartheid South Africa.

 

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