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22 October 2021 | Story Leonie Bolleurs | Photo Charl Devenish
UFS staff and students who attended the Talloires Network Leaders Conference, were from the left: Rina Widd, Occupational Therapy Student Association; Lyshea Mapaike, Social Work Student Association; Gernus Terblanche, SRC member for Civic and Social Responsibility; Relebohile Sebetoane, Eco-alliance Association; and Karen Venter.
The University of the Free State (UFS) Directorate Community Engagement was recently (30 September to 3 October 2021) among the 419 institutions and 79 countries that participated in the (virtual) Talloires Network Leaders Conference (TNLC2021).

The conference, which was a global gathering of higher education leaders and students from all regions of the world, focused on Global Institutions, Local Impact: Power and Responsibility of Engaged Universities. 

Some of the highlights of the conference were the sessions titled: Global Universities, Local Impact: Roles and Responsibilities of Universities with Philip Cotton, Head of the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Programme; and the keynote address by Secretary John Kerry, US Special Envoy on Climate, titled What can we learn from the pandemic that helps (or hinders) addressing climate change? 

Cotton, believing in the power of compassion in the transformation of young people, said: “It is possible that the more you become the kind of university that matters to our young people, because you connect with the poorest and the hardest to reach, and those most harshly oppressed by climate change, then the more serving, humane, engaged and compassionate you become. 

He added: “Listen to the young people, they are telling us what is wrong with our systems, and the solutions are in their hands.”

Addressing global challenges

According to Karen Venter, Head of the Service-Learning Division in the UFS Directorate of Community Engagement, the event provided the opportunity to critically reflect on the power and responsibility of engaged universities, to collaborate and connect in partnership with communities, and to address local and global challenges. 

“Participants shared knowledge, ideas, case studies, and built collaborations for action on important and interrelated issues, including pandemic recovery and resilience; conflict and inequality; climate justice; assessing engagement; and community engagement futures,” she says.

Some of the UFS attendees remarked that they were amazed by the work being done worldwide. They were spurred on and inspired to not only improve their modules, but also their work in the community.

Besides being exposed to world-class leaders on issues that matter, the conference also maximised engagement and forged connections on a local level. The UFS hosted a delegation of 19 academics, students, and community members from Rhodes University (RU), who not only attended the conference with them, but also an additional pre-conference digital storytelling knowledge-sharing workshop, and a mini-Engaged Learning Festival.

RU also won the McJanet Prize for Global Citizenship, following a review of 28 nominations from 15 countries and 10 finalists from 8 countries.

Sharing best practices

The digital storytelling workshop (where information about projects and people are communicated in short, multimedia tales, told from the heart), according to Venter, rekindled the UFS-RU partnership for sharing local social innovation stories globally through digital storytelling, which was born from the Common Good First EU Erasmus +-funded project.

During the learning festival, the two universities shared best practices on some of the community programmes in which they are involved, including UFS presentations from Enactus for social entrepreneurship, and the No Hungry Student initiative, which involves student residences’ community food gardens. RU reported on their active citizenship (Nine Tenths mentor mentee schools programme) and community-based research projects.

Better together

Besides international conferences such as TNLC2021, and other local engagements to always stay on top of the latest community engagement practices, the UFS and RU are both members of the South African Higher Education Community Engagement Forum (SAHECEF). According to Venter, the UFS-RU partnership showcased how different regional chapters of SAHECEF collaborated as communities of practice to advance the praxis of an engaged scholarship. 

Both the institutions are also involved in the South African Knowledge for Change (K4C) Hub within a K4C Consortium of the UNESCO Chair in Community Based Research and Social Responsibility towards training for community-based researchers in the context of community university research partnerships.

Diana Hornby, Director of Community Engagement at Rhodes University and a speaker at the conference, with Karen Venter.
Diana Hornby, Director of Community Engagement at Rhodes University and a speaker at the conference, with Karen Venter.
A group of 45 academics, students, and community members attended the recent virtual Talloires Network Leaders Conference in the UFS Computer Laboratory on the Bloemfontein Campus.
A group of 45 academics, students, and community members attended the recent virtual Talloires Network Leaders Conference in the UFS Computer Laboratory on the Bloemfontein Campus.
UFS Community Gardens.
UFS Community Gardens.

News Archive

UFS is the most integrated campus in the country
2010-01-29

 
 Judge Ian van der Merwe, Chairperson of the University of the Free State's (UFS) Council and Prof. Jonathan Jansen, Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the UFS at the official opening ceremony.
Photo: Hannes Pieterse

“The University of the Free State’s (UFS) Main Campus is the most integrated campus in the country.”

This was said by Prof. Jonathan Jansen, Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the UFS during the university’s official opening on its Main Campus in Bloemfontein today.

Addressing staff and students, Prof. Jansen said that the first-year students in the majority of the residences are now fully integrated on a 50/50 basis. “The majority of our house committees are now also integrated,” he said.

He used the ladies residence Welwitschia as an example. “When I walked into to this residence last year it consisted only of black female students. When I visited them again this year I could not believe what I saw: the residence is fully integrated and there are white and black students living together. This is an example of our young people’s willingness to live together and we must believe in their potential,” he said.

Prof. Jansen said that the UFS does not want to be good because “good is the enemy of great” (from Jim Collins in his book Good to Great). “We want to be great. This is the year in which our staff and students’ lives will change and this university will change as we take the first steps in making the leap from good to great,” he said.

Prof. Jansen said that there have been many developments at the UFS so far this year. “We have attracted some of the best scholars in the country and other parts of the world to this university, and we will be selecting from among them in the next two weeks. We have also attracted some of the best athletes in the country in our first-year class, including some of the best hockey players,” he said.

Prof. Jansen outlined the following as his priorities for 2010:

  • The phasing in of compulsory class attendance as a way to drastically improve the quality of teaching at the UFS. “This will also enhance our throughput. However, before we can to this, we are going to accelerate the building of larger classrooms to accommodate all our students,” he said.
  • The appointment of a senior vice-rector in the near future, who will manage the day to day operations of the UFS;
  • To market the UFS to the best and most promising schools in South Africa. “This will start next week when I will be visiting schools in the Eastern Cape.”
  • To raise R100 million to enable more students with talent to study at the UFS, and to build an endowment to be proud of for the future of the university;
  • To upgrade the infrastructure in the residences;
  • To require every member of the university’s academic staff to publish every year;
  • To train administrative and support staff so that a world-class service culture can be created which takes every student, every parent and every staff member seriously; and
  • To insist that the conditions of service of staff working for agencies outside the UFS be improved by increasing the minimum remuneration dramatically and by making study benefits available to them as well. “We will not renew our tenders with outside agencies unless they raise the minimum wage of their staff,” he said.

Prof. Jansen said that he was extremely proud of the Student Representative Council’s (SRC) leadership and what they have achieved so far during their term. He also thanked the staff for their hard work and the excellence they bring to the UFS.
 

Media release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Director: Strategic Communication (actg)
Tel: 051 401 2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: loaderl@ufs.ac.za  
29 January 2010
 

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