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12 March 2020 | Story Xolisa Mnukwa | Photo Supplied
Student Governance dialogue session
The UFS Student Governance office aims to motivate engaged scholarship among students and academia, to act as a reservoir of excellence in governance, and shape an excellent landscape of leadership.
“I’m anticipating philosophical discussions that will unpack moral courage, ethics in leadership, and governance,” said UFS Manager for Student Governance, Buti Mnyakeni, in opening the Division of Student Affairs’ first annual Student Governance Leadership Series (SGL) at the University of the Free State (UFS). 

The Student Governance office intends to encourage engaged scholarship among students and academia to produce a broader landscape of equipped student leaders from the university. 

UFS Vice-Rector: Institutional Change, Student Affairs, and Community Engagement, Prof Puleng LenkaBula, joined by former SRC President, Phiwe Mathe, and student leaders Sam Masingi and Amanda Charles, provided rich and provoking contributions under the theme The concept of good governance. On the first day of the series, the discourse kicked off with problematising the concept, and further led to egocentrism, and Afrocentric modalities of governance. 

The panel also unpacked the exclusivity of governmental systems by discussing institutional and managerial culture, which according to them, results in detached knowledge and ways of thinking. 

Day two of the series focused on discussions around moral courage in the era of ethical decay. Attorney of the High Court and International Economic Law Lecturer at the UFS, Mmiselo Qumba; former Vice-President of the SRC, Bokang Fako; former president of the SRC, Richard Chemaly; and freelance writer, broadcaster, author, and communicator, Ace Moloi, engaged extensively on the influence of personal values on shared ethical standards as a vehicle that can lead to a socially just community and society.

The SGL series established a platform to encourage current and prospective student leaders to reflect, connect, and be innovative in their design thinking as leaders in their respective governance structures.

The Programme Director for the event, Adv Thanduxolo Nkala – an accredited mediator in commercial and court-annexed mediation – reflected on the dialogues as “rich and robust.”

News Archive

Council votes on appointment of senior staff
2004-11-18

The Council of the University of the Free State (UFS) today voted on the filling of three senior vacancies, including one post at Dean level and two at the level of Vice-Dean.

The Council voted as follows:

Dr Natie Luyt will be offered the post of Dean: Student Affairs Prof Engela Pretorius will be offered the post of Vice-Dean: Faculty of Humanities Dr Choice Makhetha will be offered the post of Vice-Dean: Student Affairs

“There are special challenges for the UFS in the short and medium term regarding transformation of our residences, and a certain combination of management qualities and skills is desirable. As a result of the diversity of the UFS’s student community it is therefore important to us to follow a team approach to deal with the challenges. With the combination of Drs Luyt and Makhetha, I believe we will be able to manage student affairs effectively and skillfully,” says Prof Frederick Fourie, Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the UFS.

“It is wonderful that we are able to celebrate the outcome of this process that has brought forward such excellent candidates who reflect our country’s diversity. It shows that we can achieve the goals of quality and diversity at the same time,” says Prof Fourie.

Prof Pretorius obtained all her qualifications (BA, BA (Hons) (cum laude), MA (cum laude) and D Phil) from the UFS, except for the Certificate in Gender Policy Management (cum laude) which she obtained in 2000 from WITS. She joined the Department of Sociology at UFS in 1980 and has headed the Department since 2001. She acted as Vice-Dean: Faculty of Humanities since July 2004. She has some thirty publications to her credit, published both nationally and internationally and has delivered 20 national and international papers. She is a member of the South African Sociological Association and is a member of the Council of the association and of the Editorial Board of Society in Transition, the society’s journal. She is also a member of the South African Academy for Science and Art and the Federation of African Women Educationalists in South Africa (FAWESA). Project involvement includes the Australian Women’s Executive Development Programme and the project Executive Development of Senior Women in South African Higher Education Institutions. She is also an NRF panelist.

Dr Luyt obtained his qualifications (BA, BA (Hons) (cum laude), MA (cum laude) and D Phil) at the UFS and started his career at the same institution in 1980 as lecturer in Political Science. He was promoted to senior lecturer in 1983 and appointed as Director: Student Affairs in 1997. He has been acting as Dean: Student Affairs since 2003. Dr Luyt completed several work-related training courses, among others a course in ethnic and multiculturality at the Swiss Institute for Federalism and a course in conflict management at the South Tyrolean Economic and Social Institute.

Dr Makheta also obtained all her qualifications (BA, BA (Hons), MA in Political Science and Ph D in Political Science) at the UFS and started working as a student assistant in Political Science at the same institution in 1999. She was promoted to junior assistant in 2000, coordinator and facilitator of Political Science in 2001, assistant/acting Director: Student Affairs in 2001 and acting Director: Student Affairs in 2003. Dr Makhetha is currently a Senior Political Analyst at the Department of Foreign Affairs.

The UFS Council also approved the promotion of nine professors to the rank of senior professor. They are Proff Louise Cilliers (Department English and Classical Languages), Dap Louw (Department of Psychology), Philip Nel (Department Afro-Asiatic Studies, Sign Language and Language Practice), Dirk van den Berg (Department of History of Art and Visual Culture Studies) Dingie van Rensburg (Director: Centre for Health Systems Research and Develoment), Andries Raath (Department of Constitutional Law and Philosophy of Law), James du Preez (Department of Microbial, Biochemical and Food Biotechnology), Johan Grobbelaar (Department of Plant Sciences) and Louis Scott (Department of Plant Sciences).

This is the first group ever of senior professors at the UFS. The post level was created to provide better career and earnings opportunities for high quality academics and to increase the attractiveness of an academic career to young people.

Media release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Media Representative
Tel: (051) 401-2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: loaderl.stg@mail.uovs.ac.za
 

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