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Faculty of the Humanities: Engaging and empowering local Soutpan community

24 April 2023 | Story Anathi Nyadu and Avela Ntsongelwa | Photo Supplied

Humanities Soutpan community outreach — Collaborating to uplift the community of Soutpan. Staff members from the Faculty of the Humanities met with representatives of the Soutpan community to engage in community-enriching projects.

Universities have an important role to play in the healing of communities by engaging in initiatives that address social ills such as drug abuse, teenage pregnancy, violence against children, women, and the elderly.

This is according to Prof Mogomme Masoga, Dean of the Faculty of the Humanities at the University of the Free State (UFS). Prof Masoga was addressing guests, including faculty staff members and community members of Soutpan, at the launch (18 April 2023) of the faculty’s community engagement partnership with the community of Ikgomotseng in Soutpan, some 40 km outside Bloemfontein. He informed guests that the partnership was the first of many initiatives that the faculty will be engaging in with the community of Soutpan.

Flagship partnership

The flagship partnership will see participation by various departments within the faculty, including a parenting project with carers at day-care centres and in the communities, led by students from the Department of Psychology. The Department of Drama and Theatre Arts will stimulate the children’s minds through puppet shows, while the Department of History will collaborate with the community on heritage issues. During the engagement with the community, the Department of Sociology also indicated that it is launching an engaged scholarship month project for their honours and second-year Social Movements modules, where several guest lecturers will engage with students to bring stronger social context to sociological discussion. The faculty is also exploring a literacy project where it will contribute books and inculcate a culture of reading among community members.

Talking about the origin of the collaborative engagement, Dr Rosaline Sebolao, Teaching and Learning Manager in the faculty, says “the partnership emanated from a visit by the faculty to a day-care centre called Halaletsang, founded by a community leader, Belina Nhlapo, who demonstrated her passion for empowering communities. With the intention of expanding the faculty’s engaged scholarship programme, the team entered into a number of engagements that led to the identification of potential collaborative projects by departments and the community”.

Maximum societal impact with sustainable relationships

This partnership is one way in which the Faculty of the Humanities hopes to contribute to the UFS’Vision 130. The faculty aims to bring Vision 130 to reality by conducting community research and establishing quality relationships that will yield sustainable results. These results will not only impact communities but also our students who, through their engagement, will become globally competent and competitive graduates.

According to Israel Mawoyo, First-Year Success Programme (FYSP) coordinator in the faculty, the partnerships involve a working relationship for the Faculty of the Humanities and the community of Soutpan. “This partnership will create a platform for staff and students to engage in the scholarship of community engagement practices within the community. Ultimately, the Soutpan and the faculty community are to work together so that they both benefit from this partnership.”

News Archive

Extraordinary professor appointed

2005-11-10

UFS appoints its first extraordinary professor for health systems research and development

Prof Dingie van Rensburg (Director: Centre for Health Systems Research and Development at the UFS) and Prof Helen Schneider (senior researcher at the University of the Witwatersrand's Centre for Health Policy and extraordinary professor at the UFS Centre for Health Systems Research and Development). Photo: L Loader

The Centre for Health Systems Research and Development (CHSR&D) at the University of the Free State (UFS) has appointed its first extraordinary professor.

Prof Helen Schneider, former director of the Centre for Health Policy at the University of the Witwatersrand (WITS) and currently senior researcher in that Centre and consultant in the WITS School of Public Health, was appointed by CHSR&D for a period of two years.

“Prof Schneider is widely known for her thorough experience, expertise and exposure in the field of public health, health policy and management and health policy and systems research. We are honoured to have her join us as an extraordinary professor,” said Prof Dingie van Rensburg, Director of CHSR&D.

Prof Schneider will be involved in various components of the CHSR&D’s long-term project on public sector anti-retroviral treatment (ART) and will also assist in the documenting, monitoring, evaluating and facilitation of the implementation of the national treatment plan in the Free State. She is also assisting the Gauteng Department of Health in a similar way.

“The two provinces are actually so different. They provide a different window on the realities of HIV/AIDS and the intellectual traditions involved in it,” said Prof Schneider. “I hope to contribute meaningfully to finding new dimensions for research necessary in order to optimise the contribution and effect of the research on ART,” said Prof Schneider.

Another need for Prof Schneider’s appointment is to strengthen the senior research capacity of the CHSR&D, guide them with the ART project and assist in the implementation of research results into policy, management and practice.

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

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