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Dr Ria de Villiers: training the trainers of a next generation

11 January 2021 | Story Leonie Bolleurs | Photo Supplied

Ria de Villiers_web read more — Dr Ria de Villiers is passionate about education as a vehicle to ensure that people are fully engaged in work and life.

The world is rapidly changing, and the Department of Education (DBE) is responding with a plan that aims to prepare learners to adapt to a new world. Ecubed (E3), a DBE programme using playful project-based learning as a learning methodology, unlocks an entrepreneurial mindset in school learners. The E3 programme focuses on entrepreneurship, employability, and education, emphasising learning as a lifelong process. Dr Ria de Villiers is the Curriculum and Schools’ Implementation Manager for E3.

Dr De Villiers, an alumna of the University of the Free State (UFS), is passionate about education as a vehicle to unlock competencies and agency, ensuring that people are fully engaged in work and life. Dr De Villiers therefore invests great effort in contributing to a more relevant education system. “I feel compelled to do something about the challenges we see in education, especially since it is such a vital part of our human (and societal) development,” she says.

Loving the buzz at schools, the smell of dust and chalk, Dr De Villiers really has a heart for teachers. “Teachers are often unacknowledged, and the work they do is critical,” she believes. She realised that as a teacher, her reach was too small to solve the problems in the South African education system. Therefore, she works as a teacher trainer, where she feels she can have a broader impact.

Her work as implementation manager for E3 allows her to make a positive impact on the education sector, while managing the creation of new learning materials online and face to face, as well as working in teacher development.

The difference in a changed world

Talking about E3, she says the programme prepares learners to acquire skills, knowledge, attitude, and mindset to be business owners or employers while being lifelong learners. The traditional way of teaching is changing, and with skills acquired through the E3 programme, school leavers will be ready to attend a tertiary institution, be prepared for the job market, and/or be able to start a business.

This is not the first time that Dr De Villiers has found herself in the education arena. She received her doctorate in Applied Linguistics from the UFS Faculty of the Humanities under the supervision of Prof Willfred Greyling in the Department of English. Her dissertation was titled, The impact of a discourse-based teacher counselling model in training language teachers for outcomes-based education. Assisting government and teacher unions with the training of teachers helped her to obtain the data for her PhD, in which she proposed a teacher-counselling model to promote teacher efficacy and agency.

Teaching across borders

A big part of her career was spent in the education environment, although she worked as a businesswoman and freelance consultant for more than 30 years – first as teacher and university lecturer, and later as co-founder of Future Entrepreneurs, a publishing and teacher-support business.

But it was when she started a language school that her communication business, Jika Communication and Training, came into being; it was not long before this enterprise developed into a leading training organisation for entrepreneurship education programmes endorsed by the International Labour Organisation (ILO). Together with the ILO, she worked on a series of 30 business simulation games and role-plays to promote progressive teaching methodologies, learner-centredness, and activity-based experiential learning.

Teaching others about learning also allowed Dr De Villiers to cross South African borders when she facilitated the reworking of the vocational curriculum for the Indonesian government. She has done training at all teacher-training colleges in Dar-es-Salaam and Zanzibar for the Ministry of Education in Tanzania.

A more humane, learner-centred approach

In our changing world, and as it pertains to the education system, Dr De Villiers truly believes that training and teaching needs a more humane, learner-centred approach, with mutual respect between trainer and learner.

She remains inspired to continue making a difference in the sector. “I want schooling to improve and gear itself for a rapidly changing world. I want young people who are out of work to find their voice and place in the economy. I want every school learner to develop the agency and confidence to stand up in class and ask a question without any fear of losing face. And I want teachers to develop that agency too as they become more and more autonomous, self-reliant, and confident enough to teach using progressive methodologies.”

News Archive

A new dawn for student governance

2011-09-02

Our SRC presidents: Richard Chemaly (Bloemfontein Campus) and Bongani Ncgaca (Qwaqwa Campus)
Photo: Hannes Pieterse

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The successful and peaceful completion of the University of the Free State’s (UFS) Student Representative (SRC) elections 2011 herals a new dawn for student governance with the announcement of the results today (1 September 2011).

The SRC elections at the Qwaqwa Campus were completed on 25 August 2011, while the elections at our Bloemfontein Campus took place on 29 and 30 August 2011.

“A new dawn heralds a new day when Richard Chemaly, the son of Lebanese immigrants becomes President of an SRC, as elected by students from all racial backgrounds and from across the student body at large. A new day has arrived when candidates could have won voter support across racial lines; a new day is here when all SRC members are now recognised leaders on the basis of academic accountability,” the Dean of Student Affairs, Mr Rudi Buys, says.

A new dawn has arrived; firstly, insofar as student elections for the choice of student leaders at the UFS now proceed according to a non-racial and a non-party political basis.

Not only did the SRC elections at both the Bloemfontein and Qwaqwa Campuses achieve its required quorum, with 31% (4 729 votes) and 50% (2 112 votes) voter turnout, respectively, but the SRC elected by students at the Bloemfontein Campus is 55% black and 45% white, and 60% female and 40% male. The numbers of votes gained by successful candidates also indicate that voters from all racial backgrounds have voted for their candidates of choice.

Secondly, a new dawn has arrived insofar as student governance occupied by only some student groups claiming to speak on behalf of all students has made way for direct voting for candidates by the broad student body and the threefold increase of student governance structures on campus.

Not only did all students at our Bloemfontein and Qwaqwa Campuses (a total of 15 173 and 4 257, respectively) have the opportunity to participate in voting directly, but nine additional Student Councils were established at our Bloemfontein Campus that each holds an ex officio seat on the SRC and allows for student governance in all the major student sectors of the student body, such as for postgraduate students, international students and all categories of student associations.

The various councils now established include the Student Academic Affairs Council, the Student Associations Council, the Postgraduate Student Council, the International Student Council, the Student Media Council, the Residences Student Council, the Commuter Student Council and the Rag Community Service Fundraising and Service Councils. In addition, all faculties also introduced student representative structures at departmental and faculty level in 2011 to ensure student participation in faculty management and governance.

The SRC members at the Bloemfontein Campus are:

Elective portfolios:
President: Mr Richard Chemaly
Vice-President: Mr Lefata David Maklein
Secretary: Ms Matshepo Ramokgadi
Treasurer: Mr Werner Pretorius
Arts & Culture: Ms Alta Grobelaar
Accessibility & Student Support: Mr William Clayton
First-generation Students: Ms Petre du Plessis
Media, Marketing & Liaison: Ms Biejanka Calitz
Sport: Mr Bonolo Thebe
Student Development & Environmental Affairs: Ms Busisiwe Madikizela
Transformation: Ms Qaqamba Mhlauli

Ex officio portfolios:
Dialogue & Ex officio: Associations Student Council: Mr Anesu Ruswa
Academic Affairs & Ex officio: Academic Affairs Student Council: Mr Jean Vermaas
Residence Affairs & Ex officio: Campus Residences Student Council: Ms Mpho Mokaleng
City student Affairs & Ex officio: Commuter Student Council: Ms Annemieke Plekker
Postgraduate Affairs & Ex officio: Postgraduate Student Council: Ms Glancina Mokone
International Affairs & Ex officio: International Student Council: Mr Pitso Ramokoatsi
Student Media Affairs & Ex officio: Student Media Council: Ms Nicole Heyns
RAG Community Service & Ex officio: RAG Fundraising Council: Ms Iselma Parker
RAG Community Service & Ex officio: RAG Community Service Council: Ms Motheo Pooe

In the Qwaqwa elections, SASCO achieved 36,84% of the vote, with SADESMO, PASMA and NASMO each achieving 29,73% and 18,56% and 12,74%, respectively .

Mr Bongani Ncgaca was elected as the President of the SRC at our Qwaqwa Campus, while the names of the SRC members at the campus will be announced on 7 September 2011.

The Central SRC will be established on 8 September 2011 by a joint sitting of the two SRCs.

The successful completion of the SRC elections at the Bloemfontein Campus follows a yearlong review process of student governance by a Broad Student Transformation Forum (BSTF) that consists of 59 delegations from student organisations and residences. The BSTF adopted independent candidacy for elective portfolios and additional student councils to provide ex officio seats on the SRC as the template for student governance, following the consideration of a series of benchmarking reports on student governance nationally and internationally.

The UFS Council adopted the new SRC Constitution, as drafted and submitted by the BSTF, on 3 June 2011.

Media Release
1 September 2011
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Director: Strategic Communication
Tel: 051 401 2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: news@ufs.ac.za

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