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17 July 2020 | Story Nitha Ramnath | Photo iStock
The UFS initiated a new community engagement programme to help communities take charge of their lives.

The University of the Free State (UFS) is launching a new community engagement programme to help communities take charge of their lives during and after the national lockdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The E-Community Engagement Programme will run for the duration of the lockdown to ensure that the UFS continues to serve all people. This programme is one of more than 120 community development programmes and projects that the UFS is involved with this year.

Rev Billyboy Ramahlele, Director: Community Engagement, says this strategy is the result of the Institutional Transformation Plan, which seeks to deepen the university’s commitment towards the betterment of our communities by creating sustainable partnerships for development. “This programme is dedicated to assisting communities to take charge of their lives during and after this pandemic and will focus on sustainable livelihoods and family support”, he says.

With these community development programmes and projects, about 3 000 UFS students spend at least 127 000 hours per year engaging in 73 service-learning modules. This excludes the clinical work done by our medical and education students in the community through community-based education and inter-professional learning. The university’s 22 student volunteer associations play an important role in community development projects. Our academics and researchers contribute their intellectual resources through their involvement, teaching, and research in different aspects of community life.

The E-Community Engagement Programme refers to an alternative online/virtual community engagement platform aimed at facilitating continuously negotiated collaborations and partnerships between the UFS and the interest groups that it interacts with, aimed at building and exchanging the knowledge, skills, expertise, and resources required to develop and sustain society. Such alternative engagement stems from adapting physical face-to-face (f2f) community engagement to an e-environment. As a result of the uncertain state of restricted f2f engagement during the lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the focus of participation, dialogue, engaged learning, and teaching by university staff and students is on citizens actively participating in the development of their own lives and that of their surrounding communities.

Details of the E-Community Engagement Programme will soon be published on the UFS website, and will be presented on radio and online in partnership with Motheo FM, Mosupatsela FM, Kovsie FM, Mangaung Municipality, Towers of Hope, Princess Gabo Foundation, Rock Foundation, Bloemshelter, and all our faculties.


News Archive

Kovsie Alumni awards nominations now open
2005-10-31

It’s time once again to nominate candidates for the three Kovsie Alumni Awards made annually.  Nominations can be made for the Kovsie Alumnus of the Year Award, Cum Laude Award and the Alumni Award for Exceptional Service to the UFS.

The Kovsie Alumnus of the Year Award honours the outstanding achievements of a Kovsie Alumnus on national or international level.  The person must still be alife.  The Cum Laude Award is occasionally bestowed on an alumnus for outstanding service or achievement on regional, national or international level in his/her field of work.  The Alumni Award for Outstanding Service to the UFS is occasionally made to any person (not necessarily an alumnus) who delivered exceptional service to the University.
 

A written nomination for the above-mentioned awards can be submitted by any alumnus.  The nomination must be supported by at least five alumni seconders.  The nomination must be accompanied by a comprehensive motivation and a brief Curriculum Vitae of the candidate.  The candidate’s complete address and telephone number must also be provided.  Nominations can be submitted to Jeannette Boshoff-Jansen, Alumni Awards, PO Box 2319 Bloemfontein 9300.  The closing date for submission of nominations is the 14th of November 2005.
 

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