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UFS achieves top honours at the 2023 MACE Excellence Awards ceremony

05 December 2023 Photo Francois van Vuuren

MACE Awards Winners 2023 — From left are: Belinda Janeke, Head: Career Services; Barend Nagel, Multimedia Specialist, Department of Communication and Marketing; Moeketsi Mogotsi, Social Media Specialist, Department of Communication and Marketing; Lacea Loader, Senior Director: Department of Communication and Marketing; Tobias van den Bergh, Counselling Psychologist, Student Counselling and Development; Mojalefa Rabolinyane, Assistant Officer, Student Counselling and Development; Burneline Kaars, Head: Leadership, Organisational Development and Employee Well-being; Lizet Holtzhausen, Officer, Leadership, Organisational Development and Employee Well-being; Marieta Landman, Senior Officer, Department of Student Recruitment Services; and Sandile Ncedani, Senior Officer, Department of Student Recruitment Services.

On 16 November 2023, five departments at the University of the Free State made a big splash at the national association for Marketing, Advancement, and Communication in Education (MACE) 2023 Excellence Awards.

Collectively, the UFS won 11 awards, including the sought-after Chairperson’s Award of Excellence, awarded to a single entry that embodies true excellence in marketing, advancement, or communication. In other words, the overall winner across all divisions and categories.

Celebrating the best in marketing, advancement, and communication

Hosted annually, the MACE Excellence Awards recognise and celebrate the excellence of specialists and practitioners in marketing, advancement, and communication in the higher-education sector. MACE plays a vital role in adding value to practitioners through high-quality development programmes, facilitating networking partnerships and transformation, as well as promoting best practices among these professions at member institutions.

The MACE National Conference held on the Belville Campus of the University of the Western Cape from 15 to 16 November 2023, preceded the glamorous awards function. The theme for the conference was ‘Higher education institutions in a world of artificial intelligence’. After two informative days, delegates attended the awards function, where their work and skills were recognised.

The winner takes it all

The UFS Leadership, Organisational Development, and Employee Well-Being won the Chairperson’s Award for its Women’s Day Breakfast. This memorable event also received a platinum award. Silver awards were raked in by Student Counselling and Development (DoDay Mental Health Campaign), Career Services (Careers Podcast Series), Student Recruitment Services (Motion Graphics Video), and the Department of Communication and Marketing (DCM) won three silver awards for its Social Media Squad project, the Vision 130 video, and the Dr Maye Musk Honorary Doctorate Graduation Ceremony. Bronze awards were given to DCM for the Vision 130 Launch and Youth Month, and the Kovsie Connect Virtual Experience won Student Recruitment Services its second award of the evening.

Excellence in everything we do

Lacea Loader, Senior Director: Communication and Marketing and Coordinator of the MACE Excellence Awards, says the recognition affirms the high level of communication generated by the institution. “I am immensely proud of the national recognition from our peers for the quality and innovative work we do. This year in particular, different departments entered the awards programme, which is exemplary of the integration and synergy of the work done in the different departments,” she says.

News Archive

UFS in partnership with USA ’s Council on Economic Education

2006-02-01

A visit to the campus of the UFS was part of the recent NCEE workshop. Standing from the left are Prof Soehendro (Chairperson: National Education Standardisation Body of Indonesia), Prof Herman van Schalkwyk (Dean: Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences at the UFS), Prof Elena Reshetnyak (Vice-Dean for International Programs, Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute, Kharkiv, Ukraine) and Mrs Annely Minnaar (local coordinator of the NCEE and professional officer of the UFS Department of Agricultural Economics). Seated are from left Prof Sutjipto ( Chairman of the Indonesian Council on Economic Education) and Dr Patty Elder (Vice-President of the NCEE's national programme).
Photo: Stephen Collett

UFS in partnership with USA ’s Council on Economic Education

A group of 50 teachers in Economics, learning facilitators and lecturers from eight countries attended a ‘train the trainers’ workshop this past week in Bloemfontein. The workshop forms part of the outreach programme of the National Council on Economic Education (NCEE) in the United States of America’s (USA) effort to improve the quality of the training in Economics of teachers and lecturers across the world.

The UFS and the Free State Department of Education are the NCEE’s first partners in Africa. “The initiative started in the Free State because of the connection that existed between the UFS and the NCEE,” said Prof Klopper Oosthuizen, from the UFS Department of Agricultural Economics and initiator of the cooperative agreement with the NCEE.

Three faculties at the UFS are involved in the cooperative agreement namely the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, the Faculty of the Humanities and the Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences.

A group of 84 teachers and learning facilitators in the Free State attended the ‘train the teacher’ workshop at the UFS in December 2005 in an effort to improve the quality of Economics classes at schools in the Free State. The last national workshop will take place in June 2006 in Bloemfontein. During this workshop a group of 40 teachers and learning facilitators in the Free State will be trained by the NCEE.

“Because of the success with the programme in the Free State Dr Patty Elder, Vice-President of the NCEE’s national programme, announced during last week’s workshop that the initiative will now be extended to the other provinces in the country,” said Prof Oosthuizen. According to Prof Oosthuizen discussions around a strategy to get the other provinces on board of the programme also took place between Dr Elder and Prof Herman van Schalkwyk, Dean of the UFS Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences. Prof van Schalkwyk will take the lead in this regard.

“The presence of Dr Elder and the executive directors of similar education networks in the Ukraine and Indonesia is an indication of the NCEE’s seriousness with the programme in Africa,” said Prof Oosthuizen.

Prof Oosthuizen explained that South Africa is competing to obtain funds from the NCEE to have a total South African representation in the workshops in the following one-year training period.

South Africa has a good chance of establishing the network quickly because of the presentation of the last national workshop in Bloemfontein in June 2006. “We are going to try to have as much South African representation as possible at this workshop,” said Prof Oosthuizen.

Concurrent with the workshop in June 2006, a programme will be developed that will be attended by at least five other provincial education departments and representatives of five other universities. These representatives will then be able to observe on a first-hand basis how this action learning takes place and how the participating countries plan to establish and expand their networks,” said Prof Oosthuizen.

“The NCEE has been working together with international partners since 1992 to strengthen their Economics teaching systems. They have already succeeded in increasing literacy in Economics of schools in the USA and more than 20 East Block countries. More than 1,5 million learners in the East Block countries have already been served by this initiative,” said Prof Oosthuizen.

According to Prof Oosthuizen the focus of the NCEE has since 2004 moved away from the East Block countries to Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. The representatives that attended last week’s workshop were from South Africa, Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, Indonesia, Mexico, Paraguay and Uruguay. Countries such as Egypt, who was also present at last week’s workshop, are eager to start a similar network.

Media release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Media Representative
Tel: (051) 401-2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: loaderl.stg@mail.uovs.ac.za
31 January 2006

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