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03 April 2019 | Story Xolisa Mnukwa | Photo Vhugala Nthakheni
Uhuru Qwaqwa Arrival
The #UFSWalkToUhuru team arrives at the UFS Qwaqwa Campus on Friday 22 March.

The University of the Free State (UFS) Division of Student Affairs, in collaboration with the UFS Office for International Affairs, have joined hands to drive a fundraising and student-accessibility initiative dubbed, ‘The Walk to Uhuru’ (#UFSWalktoUhuru), which is aimed at raising funds and advocating for the educational rights of the less privileged. 

The project aims to raise funds in excess of R2 million from the public and stakeholders affiliated with the UFS (Kovsie staff and students). The project derives from the 2018/2019 UFS Institutional Student Representative Council (ISRC) mandate ‘Students Must Graduate’. The ISRC mandate aims to source funding opportunities for UFS students to register, and to complete their studies across all three campuses in 2020 and beyond.

The first leg of the project, a 350 km walk from the Bloemfontein to the Qwaqwa Campus, has already taken place and concluded on Friday, 22 March 2019 as planned. The #UFSWalkToUhuru team successfully completed the first leg of their journey to academic freedom for financially disadvantaged students at the UFS. The Uhuru team is now focusing its attention on the second leg and is determined to take on Mount Kilimanjaro (Uhuru) from 20 June to 20 July 2019.

The team sat down for a debriefing session to unpack the overall experience and result of the first half of the initiative, and they all agreed that the walk to Qwaqwa was an enlightening experience. It was a walk that comprised learning opportunities, team building, and goal crushing.

According to Rethabile Motseki, member of the #UFSWalkToUhuru team, the walk to Qwaqwa made a significant impact on the project, as the university community is now aware of the significant goals that the team is trying to accomplish. The team has also resumed their fitness-training programme to ensure that they are ready to take on the Uhuru climb in June.

A media briefing will take place shortly (date to be confirmed) to detail the ongoing fundraising initiatives rolled out by the #UFSWalkToUhuru team.  We implore you, and the nation as a whole, to help establish a better future for disadvantaged UFS students by donating to the initiative.

Students, staff, and the public can support the cause and make contributions/donations to the initiative by visiting the UFS Walk to Uhuru #givengain account page.

For more information, contact UFS SRC President, Sonwabile Dwaba, on DwabaSJ@ufs.ac.za  or Rethabile Motseki on MotsekiR@ufs.ac.za  

News Archive

UFS Faculty of Theology and Jonathan Edwards Centre at Yale University forge strategic partnership
2009-06-10

 
Prof. Francois Tolmie, Dean of the UFS’s Faculty of Theology.
Photo: Supplied


The Faculty of Theology at the University of the Free State (UFS) will establish a Jonathan Edwards Centre for Southern Africa, affiliated with the Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University in New Haven in the United States of America.

This strategic partnership exemplifies the vision of the Faculty of Theology to be an internationally renowned theological and training faculty.

The UFS Jonathan Edwards Centre will serve as a research, education and publication hub for the study of Edwards and evangelical history and develop links with the international academic community.

Prof. Francois Tolmie, Dean of the Faculty of Theology at the UFS, said, “I welcome the plans to pay sustained critical attention to Edwards’s thought. Jonathan Edwards was an important American theologian, philosopher and more specifically America's greatest contributor to mission theology in Southern Africa.”

Dr Kenneth Minkema, Executive Director of the Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale University, adds: “The establishment of the Jonathan Edwards Center Southern Africa at the UFS in Bloemfontein is a significant expansion of Edwards scholarship and will serve widely both academia and the church.”

Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758), pastor, revivalist, Christian philosopher, missionary, and president of Princeton University, is widely regarded as North America’s greatest theologian. He is the subject of intense scholarly interest because of his significance as an historical figure and the profound legacy he left on America’s religious, political and intellectual landscapes.

In recent years, a rapidly growing interest in Edwards as theologian has brought the man and his writings onto the world stage, pressing beyond the popular and more parochial image of Edwards primarily as American preacher and American historic figure. Increasingly, his writings are being consulted by religious leaders, pastors, and churches around the world, spurred by a growing recognition of the fervency and universality of the Edwards message and the acumen with which he appraised religious experience.

This interest in Edwards globally has been fuelled in part by the work of the Jonathan Edwards Centre at Yale University, whose sole mission is to support inquiry into the life, writings, and legacy of Jonathan Edwards by providing resources that encourage critical appraisal of the historical importance and contemporary relevance of America’s premier theologian. The primary means to achieve this is with the The Works of Jonathan Edwards Online, a digital learning environment for research, education and publication that presents all of Edwards’s writings, along with helpful editorial materials that allow the reader to examine Edwards's thought in incredibly powerful, useful ways. The Works of Jonathan Edwards Online 2.0 is accessible through the Centre’s website at: www.edwards.yale.edu.

Media Release:
Mangaliso Radebe
Assistant Director: Media Liaison
Tel: 051 401 2828
Cell: 078 460 3320
E-mail: radebemt.stg@ufs.ac.za
10 June 2009

 

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