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19 October 2022 | Story Leonie Bolleurs
Dr Pieter du Toit
Dr Pieter du Toit, President of the Convocation, recently addressed more than 200 Convocation members at the Annual General Meeting.

What if you knew there was a body whose endeavours sought to be dynamic and engaging, promote excellence, welcome inclusion, and serve its alma mater?

One of the aims of the UFS Convocation – a body of more than 40 000 members – is to pay close attention to and engage on matters pertaining to governance, administration, and academic affairs at the University of the Free State (UFS).

This entity seeks to ensure that the research outputs of the university are communicated in a positive light, and that feedback is provided to ensure that the current academic programmes are adequate to enhance graduate employability. Among their goals is to provide a forum for unemployed graduates to share their skills, expertise, and abilities.

Furthermore, this body attempts to establish dialogue around social issues and ongoing transformation.

 

Fostering a spirit of belonging

According to Dr Pieter du Toit, President of the UFS Convocation, it is important for this structure that it stays relevant to its members and society and that it fosters a spirit of belonging. He recently addressed members on the UFS Bloemfontein Campus at the Annual General Meeting, the first to be held in the past two years. Besides the in-person attendance, the meeting was also attended by more than 200 members via livestream.

Dr Du Toit explained to members – which, according to legislation, include all persons who have obtained a formal qualification from the UFS, as well as all permanent academic staff members that the Convocation strives to promote a positive image of the UFS, advancing and safeguarding its reputation.

Also speaking at the AGM was the UFS Rector and Vice-Chancellor, Prof Francis Petersen. He reflected on the state of the UFS, talking about the past five years to date. He touched on matters pertaining to the core functions of the university, including teaching and learning, research and internationalisation, and engaged scholarship.

As stated in its vision, the UFS strives to be a research-led, student-centred, and regionally engaged university in Bloemfontein, the Free State, South Africa, and the continent.

In the past five years, the UFS’ framework of guidance has been the Integrated Transformation Plan, which endeavoured to emphasise social justice; the UFS Strategic Plan, the focus of which was to enhance the scope of transformation by following a holistic approach; and the Vice-Chancellor’s Strategic projects, aimed at creating a high-performance institution. “To be able to do what you need to do, you have to be at the top of your game,” said Prof Petersen.

In addition, the UFS has also been guided by the University Risk Management Committee and the Institutional Multi-stakeholder Group, which is a safe space that impacts the progression of an inclusive culture of belonging at the UFS.

Prof Petersen also referred to the 2020/2021 period during the COVID-19 pandemic. “There were three imperatives to which the UFS was committed during this period – the health and safety of staff and students, ensuring that no staff member or student was left behind, and successfully completing the 2020/2021 academic year,” stated Prof Petersen.

According to him, the university has engaged in different strategies to ensure that students were not left behind academically, and that committed staff did not overextend themselves. “We have dealt with it in such a way that our success rate for undergraduate studies has improved, which indicates the resilience of our students and the commitment of our staff,” he said.

The UFS is one of the nation's top universities for student success.

 

Optimising our research capacity

Two of the research successes of this year were an increase in research outputs and in the number of postgraduate students. The university is also working towards increasing the number of academic staff with PhDs, as well as its number of postdoctoral fellows. “We are looking at optimising our research capacity,” stated Prof Petersen.

Regarding engaged scholarship, Prof Petersen believes that if you cannot positively impact society through teaching and learning and research, you should ask why you exist as a university.

“We as a university is in a good place and I think you can be very proud of your alma mater,” he said.

For the way forward, the university is working on Vision130 (a strategy spanning over 12 years). “The vision will be quite bold, including goals for 75% of academic staff to have obtained their PhDs, a bigger focus on the postgraduate programme, and to be one of the top-five institutions in the country and one of the top-600 in the world. We will also reduce our student numbers to around 35 000, because we believe this is the number that we should be focusing on,” stated Prof Petersen.

“As members of the Convocation, I ask you to find a place in Vision130, to see how you can contribute to make this university a better institution than it is today,” he added.

Concluding his presentation, Prof Petersen told members of the Convocation, “You are immensely important to us as a university – you are the continuity between the past and the present as well as the future.”

Full-time UFS staff and alumni are welcome to contact the President of the Convocation with suggestions at convocation@ufs.ac.za

 

 

What is the Convocation?

  • It is important for the Convocation that it stays relevant to its members and society and that it fosters a spirit of belonging for alumni by keeping the communication channels with members open.
  • The Convocation strives to promote a positive image of the UFS, advancing and safeguarding its reputation.
  • The Convocation seeks to ensure that the research outputs of the university are communicated in a positive light, and that feedback is provided to ensure that the current academic programmes are adequate to enhance graduate employability.
  • Furthermore, this body attempts to establish dialogue around social issues and ongoing transformation.
  • In addition to promoting the institution's business and community interests, this structure aims to instil respect for the UFS.
  • Its goal is to instil in alumni a sense of responsibility, obligation, and accountability towards the community in general and to their alma mater in particular.

 Who is part of the Convocation?

  • All persons who have obtained a formal qualification from the UFS, as well as all permanent academic staff members.

 How often does the Convocation meet?

  • The Convocation sees to it that members meet at least once every two years.


News Archive

Prestigious Helgaard Steyn Prize to be awarded to UFS composer
2010-11-08

 Hans Huyssen.

The composer Hans Huyssen, affiliated with the Department of Music at the University of the Free State (UFS), is to be the current recipient of the prestigious 2010 Helgaard Steyn Prize, the prize-winning work being Huyssen’s Proteus Variations (2006).Annually this award is administered and presented to a selected composer, painter, author, or sculptor by the Universities of the Free State and the North-West on a rotating basis. The judges for this year’s prize were Prof. Bertha Spies, Research Fellow, North-West University, and Professor Extraordinary, University of Pretoria, and Mr Noel Stockton, Senior Lecturer at the University of the Free State.

Hans Huyssen’s musical activities encompass the diverse poles of early and contemporary Western and African music, often in an attempt to assimilate the essential qualities from all these fields. His intense focus on contextuality suggests that he approaches music as a profoundly social force which has a particular role to play in our ‘new’ diversified South African society.

The Proteus Variations were commissioned by the Deutsche Welle Radio for the South African National Youth Orchestra 2006, and were premiered at the Beethoven Bonn Festival during 2006. These variations are described by the composer as “a musical representation of South Africa’s manifold Proteaceae”, named for the Greek god Proteus who, at will, was capable of assuming a spectrum of shapes and appearances. As the composer states: “It is worth noticing that a Protea is South Africa’s national flower. What could be more appropriate in providing a key to an opposite perception and understanding of the country’s diverse cultural expressions? In this regard it is my hope that the Proteus Variations may contribute a little to the wide scope of cultural responses necessary to begin to do justice to the extremely rich tapestry of our immediate cultural and natural surroundings”.

The prize of R170 000 will be awarded to Hans Huyssen by a representative of ABSA Trust, who is one of the trustees of the Helgaard Steyn Trust, in Bloemfontein on 8 November 2010.

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