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05 February 2019 | Story Xolisa Mnukwa | Photo Moeketsi Mokgotsi
KovsieAct Eco Cars Read More
Kovsies weld their way to a sustainable environment

The 2019 group of first-year students can look forward to a fun and adventure-filled first two weeks (28 January–9 February) of varsity life, as a number of projects and activities await them.

Kovsie ACT’s main theme for 2019 revolves around building ‘awareness’. This includes a tree-and-traffic-signs project which entails old T-shirts/material being sewn/crocheted together to make different patterns to be fitted around the trees on campus in order to create a beautiful piece of art portraying a message of ‘awareness’.

A canvas painting will also form part of the events, as first-years – with the help of their seniors – will be required to put together a painting that addresses environmental, crime, gender-based, and other societal issues that will later be placed on the wall at the Thakaneng Bridge.

On the morning of 9 February 2019, seniors will tackle the community-engagement leg of the Kovsie ACT line-up, working in their respective teams to decorate an eco-vehicle from waste materials. Each team has their own Pit stop – decorated in F1 style. This eco-vehicle race will take place on Saturday morning from 09:00 – 12:00 in Academia road (in front of Emily Hobhouse Residence).  In addition, art sculptures will be built to form part of the Eco-vehicle race. These art pieces - if approved – will after the Eco-vehicle challenge be assigned a spot on campus where it can spread the message of awareness and be appreciated by fellow students.

The abovementioned projects are expected to withstand adverse weather conditions and last for a minimum of six months.

To close off the Kovsie ACT activities, students and the public can see forward to exciting performances during the Kovsie ACT music festival on the evening of 9 February. This will include musical sensations such as the likes of Sho Madjozi, Bittereinder, Busiswa, and many more.

Tickets for the festival are available at the UFS Bloemfontein Campus Rag Farm and the Food Zone store. For more information on Kovsie ACT, visit https://www.ufs.ac.za/rag or contact Esmé Wessels at WesselsE@ufs.ac.za

News Archive

UFS hosts international conference on palynology - tribute to Prof Louis Scott
2014-07-23

 

Prof Louis Scott

Some of the world’s eminent palaeontologists and palynologists gathered at the University of the Free State (UFS) to attend a conference held in the honour of one of our own.

Prof Louis Scott, one of South Africa’s leading palynologists and former chairman of the Department of Plant Sciences at the UFS, recently retired. In recognition of his great contribution to promoting palynology, an international symposium was held from 7 – 11 July 2014 at the Bloemfontein Campus.

Palynology is the study of pollen grains and spores in archaeological findings.

The symposium, ‘From Past to Present – Changing Climates, Ecosystems and Environments of Arid Southern Africa. A Tribute to Louis Scott’, featured the works and findings of researchers from South Africa, USA, UK, Israel and Tanzania.

Prof Francis Thackeray from the Institute of Human Evolution at the University of the Witwatersrand delivered the keynote address. He said South Africa has a rich palaeontological heritage relating to human evolution within the late Pliocene, Pleistocene and Holocene.

Prof Thackeray said that the “identification and quantification of changes in climate and habitat are essential for assessing evolutionary processes associated with hominine species in the genera Australopithecus, Paranthropus and Homo. Attempts have been made to quantify changes in palaeotemperature and moisture using multivariate analysis of pollen spectra from sites such as Wonderkrater.”

Prof Thackeray dedicated his address to Prof Scott.

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