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Qwaqwa Campus gears up to showcase research and scholarship at the 2022 research conference

15 September 2022 | Story NONSINDISO QWABE | Photo UFS Photo Gallery

Recent global happenings have challenged communities and humanity’s capability to solve immediate and major problems. Science has been one of the spaces in which the communities have looked for solutions regarding real threats to lives related to climate change, wars, as well as social and health pandemics. The Qwaqwa Campus will be showcasing Qwaqwa Campus research and scholarship at this year’s research conference, a two-day event which will be held in person, on 29-30 September 2022 at the Senate Hall on campus.

‘Scholarship, Innovation and Science: how can research be used as a tool for the betterment of society?’

Under this theme, the conference will be a space for intellectual debate and the processing of scholarship in innovation, said Prof Pearl Sithole, Vice-Principal: Academic and Research. “Some of the societal challenges have been urgent and pressing, yet some are slow dilemmas shattering the hope of generations for a better future. This conference will present the products of ‘disciplinary and scholarly crafts’, but it also seeks to explore whether science does (or should) have a strategic direction, and perhaps this is what the concept of innovation should entail. It will ponder on whether in the age-old binary between exploratory research and praxis there is a defeating taming of the entrepreneurial edge for the expanse of science in Africa,” she said.

Prof Sithole said the campus would also be launching its research strategy for 2022 to 2026.

Guest speakers include:

• Prof Percy Hlangothi is an Associate Professor of Physical and Polymer Chemistry at the Nelson Mandela University. He is also the inaugural Director of the Centre for Rubber Science and Technology, a research entity in the Faculty of Science at the same institution.

• Mr Lukhona Mnguni is a governance, politics, and development specialist and prolific political analyst specialising in Africa and international relations, as well as a PhD intern at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. He currently serves as the Head of Policy and Research at the Rivonia Circle. His work includes a current affairs analytical show on eNCA dubbed On the Spot with Lukhona Mnguni.

• Prof Dipane Hlalele is a Professor of Education and a C2 NRF-rated researcher. He is a highly rated scholar in inclusive education, critical pedagogy, and educational psychology at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Prior to joining UKZN as an associate professor in 2017, he was an assistant dean and senior lecturer at the UFS, a college of education lecturer, and a high school deputy principal and teacher.

To RSVP please click here on or before 19 September 2022.

News Archive

Report card for UFS outlines major achievements

2005-02-04

Staff at the University of the Free State (UFS) have received above-inflation increases in remuneration averaging 18,2 percent since the year 2000, according to the Rector and Vice-Chancellor, Prof Frederick Fourie.

Delivering a keynote speech at the Official Opening of the UFS today, Prof Fourie gave a report card for the UFS which he said indicated significant progress in salaries and promotions as well as capital expenditure and infrastructure development on the campus.

“The aggregate extra earnings of staff (money in their pockets above inflation) from 2000 to 2005 amount to R75 million in salaries. This is the result of the hard work of all staff and we pay tribute to them,” he said.

Prof Fourie said that several categories of staff are better off than before the financial turn-around strategy was implemented in 2000 which aimed to make the UFS a financially sustainable campus.

The lowest paid workers and professors had received an additional structural correction, which gave professors at the UFS a 27% above-inflation increase (on total remuneration package) since 2000.

He said there had also been a dramatic increase in promotions to associate professor and full professor during the last 6 years.

From 1999 to December 2001, there were only 9 promotions to associate professor. From January 2002 to January 2005, there were 37 such promotions to associate professor, four times as many.

Regarding promotions to full professor, from 1999 to December 2001 there were 7 promotions. From January 2002 to January 2005, there were 31 promotions to full professor, more than four times as many.

“We have also created a new category of senior professor to give due recognition to the outstanding work of our leading academics in many fields,” Prof Fourie said.

The UFS has introduced numerous new and innovative learning programmes, together with an increasing number of community service modules which enhanced the UFS as a leader in service learning and helped to make it a university engaged with its surrounding community.

According to Prof Fourie the number of support staff had also grown along with the professionalisation of the support services.

He said management was aware that there still several challenges regarding staff overload and staff development but that these were being addressed

Media release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Media Representative
Tel: (051) 401-2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: loaderl.stg@mail.uovs.ac.za
4 February 2005

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