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Stephan scoops Architecture Student of the Year Award

06 December 2019 | Story Valentino Ndaba | Photo Supplied

If all works out, Kovsie student Stephan Diedericks could change the face of the Mangaung Metropolitan Muncipality’s transportation facilities and save the city millions in maintenance costs while generating income.

The Masters Architecture graduate designed an innovative model titled An Interminable Living Machine: Humanizing and Re-appropriating the dormant Mangaung Intermodal Transport Facility (MITF) into a living, economic systems of change which won him the Corobrik Regional Student of the Year Award. The awards ceremony was hosted by the UFS Department of Architecture on 22 November 2019 at the Bloemfontein Campus.

A living machine

Re-appropriating the Bloemfontein taxi terminal located in the Central Business District (CBD) which has been non-operational for a few years would mean that the building sustained itself, and acted a power generator both environmentally and economically.

Diedericks was inspired by the need to improve the quality of life for the people of City of Roses. “This course helped to broaden my perspective on the power of architecture and the social change that it can bring to people's lives,” he said.

An environmentally-friendly concept

According to the young architect, the facility would be water efficient. “Bloemspruit channels run underneath the proposed site and water will be filtered through biologically that will provide water to the entire site creating a self-sufficient living building with water at its heart.”

A thriving economic hub

Diedrick’s 220-page thesis details how the site of the intervention was once home to Bloemfontein’s first power station and that it is this concept of power generation that led him to place clients at the centre of the project as a catalyst for change.

“The Small, Medium and Micro Enterprise Business (SMME) division of the Free State Department of Economic, Small Business Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs (DESTEA) serves as the catalyst and a power generator that breaks open the solid mass of the MITF. Several subsystems, including aquaponics and SMME training, feed of the main catalyst and in turn provide resources in the form of food and business training to ground-floor users and micro-enterprise users onto latch onto over many decades of growth,” he explained.

A bright future ahead

"The only thing that we have and you don’t is experience,” said Petria Smit, a lecturer at the Department. “Some of your talent far exceeds ours.” During the awards ceremony, she said it was a privilege to work with students of such impressive calibre.

The awards, which were hosted for the 32nd year, are a way for the Department, in collaboration with Corobrik, to reward the talent of students. Diedericks said his win was a great honour and worth the many hours he had sacrificed for this course. Having bagged his master’s, Diedericks’s future plans are to work for the City of Bloemfontein as an architect or on an urban level when an opportunity arises.

News Archive

First-year students encouraged to attend UFS welcoming function

2005-01-12

The University of the Free State (UFS) will host a welcoming function for all new first-year students and their parents on Saturday 15 January 2005 in the Callie Human Centre on the main campus in Bloemfontein.

The function starts at 11.00 and will be addressed by the Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the UFS, Prof Frederick Fourie. UFS staff will also be available to provide vital information to first-year students on academic matters.

According to UFS Registrar, Mr Vernon Collett, Saturday’s welcoming function can assist students and parents by providing vital information on the many high quality academic learning programmes on offer at the UFS in six faculties.

“If students and parents have this information it will make the registration process which starts next week Monday 17 January much smoother,” Mr Collett said.

The UFS has split the registration process into various categories of students and Mr Collett appealed to all students to adhere to the dates and times which apply to them as a one-stop service will be available so as to avoid unnecessary delays in the registration process.

The registration of first-time entering first-year students who applied before 30 November 2004 to study at the Bloemfontein campus will take place from Monday 17 January 2005 to 21 January 2005 at the Callie Human Centre.

Senior undergraduate students (that is, students entering their second or later year of study) may register from 22 to 29 January 2005.

Postgraduate students, first time entering first year students and other students who applied for admission to the main campus after 30 November 2004 must register at the Callie Human from 31 January 2005 to 4 February 2005.

Due to the limitations placed by government on student numbers, the applications of students who applied late will be regarded as pending and will be processed as places became available.

Vista campus

The Vista campus in Bloemfontein – which was incorporated into the UFS in January 2004 – no longer accepts applications from first-year students. Such prospective students had to apply to the UFS main campus.

Students who had been registered as Vista students last year must register at the Vista campus on the same dates as applicable on the main campus.

Qwaqwa Campus

At the Qwaqwa campus of the UFS, all first-time entering first-year students must report on 17 January 2005, after which the registration of these students will take place according to a specific programme.

The official welcoming functioning for new first-years at the Qwaqwa campus of the UFS will take place on Saturday 22 January 2005 at 11am in the Rolihlahla Mandela Hall on the Qwaqwa campus. As on the main campus, this function will also be addressed by the Rector and Vice-Chancellor, Prof Fourie.

Mr Collett appealed to first-year students who have applied to study at the Qwaqwa campus and their parents to attend this function which fulfills the same role as the one held on the Bloemfontein campus.

Detailed information on the dates and times of registration for the various faculties and academic learning programmes is available on the UFS website: http://www.uovs.ac.za/content.php?cid=9

Prospective students may also call 051-401-3000 for more information.

Media release
Issued by: Anton Fisher
Media Representative
Cell: 072-207-8334

12 January 2005

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