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05 May 2022 | Story Leonie Bolleurs | Photo Supplied
Prof Hennie van Coller and Prof Hendrik Swart
Prof Hennie van Coller, left, received the the NP van Wyk Louw medal, and Prof Hendrik Swart, right, received the Havenga Prize for Physical Sciences.

The board of the Suid-Afrikaanse Akademie vir Wetenskap en Kuns (SAAWK) recently (22 April) announced the winners of the 2022 prizes. The academy, which was established in 1901, aims to promote the use of Afrikaans in science and the arts.

Havenga Prize for Physical Sciences

Prof Hendrik Swart, NRF B1-rated researcher, SARChI Research Chair in Solid-state Luminescent and Advanced Materials, and Senior Professor in the Department of Physics at the University of the Free State (UFS), received the prestigious Havenga Prize for Physical Sciences.

He says it is an honour to receive this award. “When I look at the list of names that have received the award in the past, I am very humbled and surprised to receive such an award.”

The Havenga Prize, for which candidates are specifically judged on research publications and evidence of their promotion of Afrikaans, has been awarded annually for the past 77 years for original research in the natural sciences or a technical field. 

A collaboration with researchers from the Nelson Mandela University (NMU) on semiconductor materials that improve the efficiency of solar cells, resulted in Prof Japie Engelbrecht (Emeritus Professor, NMU) nominating Prof Swart for this award. He is involved in an NRF collaborative research project with NMU and Linköping University in Sweden.

Prof Swart has played an important role in the acquisition of numerous research devices for analysing the thin layer of phosphor, and the semiconductor devices that can be made from such materials. His research and zeal for his work led to the establishment of the national nano-surface characterisation facility (NNSCF) containing state-of-the-art surface characterisation equipment. 

The PHI Quantes XPS system, for instance, is the first in Africa and one of only 20 in the world. The Quantes XPS system uses X-rays to determine the chemical composition of molecules on the surface of a sample. The system is unique in the sense that it also has an extra X-ray source that can determine the chemical state below the surface, which was not possible in the past. This will help to dictate the position of defects in phosphor materials, which will consequently enable the department to create better phosphor for solid-state lighting as well as solar cell applications.

The most meaningful for him, however, was the production of several well-trained postgraduate students and the generation of high-impact, well-cited scientific publications.

This award, one of several awards he has received during his career, does not signify the end of the road. On the contrary, he is looking forward to improving solar cells by using the phosphor materials they have manufactured, applying it on glass windows doped with phosphors to generate electricity.

NP van Wyk Louw Medal and Alba Bouwer Prize for children's literature

The NP van Wyk Louw Medal was awarded to Prof Hennie van Coller, a researcher who is also affiliated to the UFS. Prof Van Coller, currently an emeritus outstanding professor and research fellow at the university, was a former Head of the UFS Department of Afrikaans and Dutch, German and French, as well as Chairperson of SAAWK. He is known for his impact on the literary world, both locally and internationally, through the quality of his scientific articles and books. 

According to SAAWK, the body awards the NP van Wyk Louw Medal for a person’s creative contributions to the exploitation, organisation, and continuous development of a section of the humanities, significantly contributing to the advancement of the humanities.

Jaco Jacobs, the children’s author of more than 170 books who recently presented the 35th DF Malherbe Memorial Lecture at the UFS, was also awarded for his work. Jacobs, also a UFS alumnus, received the Alba Bouwer Prize for children's literature. The prize, which is awarded every three years, was presented to Jacobs for the book Die boekwinkel tussen die wolke, written during the COVID-19 lockdown period. 

SAAWK will present the awards later this year during two virtual award ceremonies in July. 

News Archive

Leader of Bafokeng nation delivers a guest lecture at UFS
2011-05-05

 
Kgosi Leruo Molotlegi, leader of the Royal Bafokeng, Proff. Teuns Verschoor, Vice-Rector: Institutional Affairs, Jonathan Jansen, Vice-Chancellor and Rector of our university, and Hendri Kroukamp, Dean of our Faculty Economic and Management Sciences (acting).
Photo: Stephen Collett

Kgosi Leruo Molotlegi, leader of the Royal Bafokeng nation, asked the pertinent questions: Who decides our fate as South Africans? Who owns our future? in the JN Boshoff Memorial Lecture at our university.

He said: “It’s striking that today, with all the additional freedoms and protections available to us, we have lost much of the pioneering spirit of our ancestors. In this era of democracy and capitalist growth (systems based on choice, accountability, and competition), we nevertheless invest government with extraordinary responsibility for our welfare, livelihoods, and even our happiness. We seem to feel that government should not only reconcile and regulate us, but also house us, school us, heal us, employ us, even feed us.

“And what government can’t do, the private sector will. Create more jobs, invest in social development and the environment, bring technical innovations to our society, make us part of the global village. But in forfeiting so much authority over our lives and our society to the public and private sectors, I believe we have given away something essential to our progress as people and a nation: the fundamental responsibility we bear for shaping our future according to aims, objectives, and standards determined by us.”

He shared the turnaround of the education system in the 45 schools in the 23 communities of the Bafokeng nation and the effect of greater community, NGOs, the church and other concerned parties’ engagement in the curricula and activities with the audience. School attendance improved from 80% to 90% in two years and the top learners in the matric maths in Northwest were from the Bafokeng nation. 

Kgosi Leruo Molotlegi stressed the need for people to help to make South Africa a better place: “As a country, we speak often of the need for leadership, the loss of principles, a decline in values. But too few of us are willing to accept the risk, the expense, the liability, and sometimes even the blame, that accompanies attempting to make things better. We are trying to address pressing issues we face as a community, in partnership with government, and with the tools and resources available to us as a traditionally governed community. It goes without saying that we can and should play a role in deciding our fate as members of this great country, and in the Royal Bafokeng Nation, as small as it is, we are determined to own our own future.”

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