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26 November 2020
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Story Leonie Bolleurs
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Mind Matters is a first for the UFS. It is a mental-health publication for students aimed at highlighting what matters most when it comes to your mind, life, and well-being. Some sections share how individuals in the top echelons of the UFS take care of their minds. Other sections focus on how to support your grey matter (i.e. your brain) and, consequently, improve your general functioning. Some parts discuss matters related to careers, well-being, finance, and self-development. We also provide news and resources that might matter to you.
Whatever your fancy, Mind Matters focuses primarily on why the health of your mind matters. Our minds and brains are the most powerful intelligence or apparatuses on the planet. A power like this needs to be wielded wisely, otherwise we may suffer much from our own neglect of our mental health. It’s not always easy, but it is important!
Mind Matters was possible due to the cumulative contributions, inputs, and work of numerous UFS professionals, especially within
Student Affairs. We are grateful and proud of each person involved. We endeavour to honour these efforts by continually improving and developing Mind Matters. Your feedback and voices are most welcome and will continue to inform what we do next.
Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching goes to trailblazer Dr Aliza le Roux
2013-11-15
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Dr Aliza le Roux
Photo: Supplied
15 November 2013 |
Dr Aliza le Roux, Subject Head in the Department of Zoology and Entomology at the UFS Qwaqwa Campus, is this year’s winner of the Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching.
It came as no surprise. Dr le Roux has already been piling up numerous awards as a result of her outstanding work as an academic who is also an NRF-rated researcher.
In 2012, she joined the Teaching and Learning Champions group, which inspired her to take a more scholarly, research-focused approach to her teaching. Dr Le Roux has had huge successes in her teaching at the Qwaqwa Campus, propelling student pass rates from less than 50% to more than 90% in one course. As part of her approach, she makes use of interventions such as pre-class quizzes on Blackboard.
She is also doing Action Research on the teaching method known as ‘flipping’ the classroom, a process that essentially reversed traditional teaching practice. Dr le Roux is also looking into the impact of introducing Zotero (a free user-friendly online tool for research purposes) on the Qwaqwa Campus.
Her primary research outside of the classroom focuses on the evolution of wild mammals’ cognitive abilities. Dr le Roux and her students are starting fieldwork in November this year, investigating how paternal care impacts bat-eared foxes’ physical and cognitive development.