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26 August 2022 | Story Anthony Mthembu | Photo Supplied
Katleho Nkosi
Katleho Nkosi’s design, which won him second place in the national design competition during the Student Entrepreneurship Week 2022.

Katleho Nkosi, a fourth-year Education student at the University of the Free State (UFS), obtained second place in a national design competition hosted virtually by Entrepreneurship Development in Higher Education (EDHE). 

The national design competition formed part of the launch of the Student Entrepreneurship Week 2022, which took place at the University of Venda on 18 August 2022. As such, students from many of the universities in the country, including Nkosi, took part in designing a poster that would be used to advertise the event. 

Nkosi is delighted and excited about this accomplishment. “This win was really surprising and unbelievable for me, because obtaining the second-place position means that my work is good,” said Nkosi.

The participants were allowed to conceptualise and submit their final product between 28 June and 15 July 2022. “I had no experience in this space, I only designed content for fun, and I participated in this competition because I was motivated by a friend,” Nkosi highlighted. 

Click to view document  Click here to view poster in full size.


The motivation behind the design

Since the Student Entrepreneurship Week was held at the University of Venda, Nkosi used the vibrancy and colourfulness of Venda as inspiration for his design. “When I was designing the poster, the only thing on my mind was making sure that I put something together that was related to Venda,” he explained. In addition, the theme for the Entrepreneurship Week was ‘Move to Market’, and Nkosi asserts that he tried to integrate the theme with Venda, and this is how the design came about.

The outcome of the competition and future plans

Although Nkosi did not win the competition, he did receive a cash prize for being among the top three. Furthermore, given his accomplishment, Nkosi would like to take part in many more design competitions moving forward. “Now that I have realised that I have the potential to win, I think I can take this as a career path in the future,” he said. Nkosi is also looking at merging his love of teaching with his newfound love for design. “I’m going to try and find the connection between design and education, because I really love to teach, so I could perhaps become a design teacher,” Nkosi expressed

News Archive

UFS Chemistry wins dti award
2010-11-02

At the awards ceremony are, from the left: Director-General of Trade and Industry Mr Tshediso Matona, Prof. Andreas Roodt and the Deputy-Minister of Trade and Industry, Ms Bongi Maria Ntuli.
Photo: S Osman

The research group of Prof. Andreas Roodt, Head of the Department of Chemistry at the University of the Free State (UFS) in Bloemfontein, won the first prize in the category Development of Small Medium and Micro-Enterprises (SMME) at the annual Department of Trade and Industry’s (dti) award ceremony.

Prof. Roodt received the prize for the high-technology project Development of novel nuclear pharmaceuticals in the Technology and Human Resources for Industry Programme (THRIP).

The Deputy-Minister of Trade and Industry Bongi Maria Ntuli, and Director-General Tshediso Matona presented the prize at the gala dinner held at Gallagher Estate, Gauteng in October 2010.

The dti’s Annual Technology Awards recognise excellence in research and aim to raise awareness on the benefits of using technology to improve the competitiveness of enterprises, within the local and global arena. Individuals and organisations are recognised for their efforts in advancing and promoting technology interests and emerging enterprises.

The technology awards cover the achievements of three of the dti technology programmes collectively, namely THRIP, managed by the National Research Foundation (NRF); the Support Programme for Industrial Innovation (SPII) managed by the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC); and the Small Enterprise Development Agency (seda) Technology Programme (stp).

Prof. Roodt, also vice-president of the European Crystallographic Association, who has just returned from a series of lectures abroad after being elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry in the UK, has received funding in excess of R3 million over the past two years to set up a specialised laboratory for synthesising active compounds. Key partners in this project are Dr Gerdus Kemp from PETLabs Pharmaceuticals in Pretoria; Prof. Connie Medlen (pharmacologist), recently appointed affiliate professor at UFS Chemistry; as well as Prof. Deon Visser from the Inorganic Chemistry research group at the UFS.

The research aims to produce new nuclear medicinal agents for the early diagnosis of cancer, heart and brain defects, and even HIV/ Aids.

Two doctoral students, Alice Brink and Marietjie Schutte, are currently actively involved in this project. They are the recipients of prestige scholarships introduced by the UFS Rector and Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Jonathan Jansen, under the UFS Research Initiative (the Advanced Biomolecular Systems Cluster) to complete their Ph.D. studies.

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

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