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24 March 2023 | Story Samkelo Fetile | Photo Hannes Naude
Shimlas copy
FNB UFS Shimlas huddle up before the game in front of their home fans

The Varsity Cup returns on Monday, 27 March 2023, when archrivals in Free State rugby, the University of the Free State (UFS) and Central University of Technology (CUT) face off in the battle for points at Shimla Park, on the Bloemfontein Campus at 19:00.  

The derby fields some of the most illustrious stars, slugging it out for silverware and bragging rights in a rivalry that seems to intensify with each new encounter. Adding further spice to the derby is their last encounter in 2022 when the FNB UFS Shimlas won, but the FNB CUT Ixias who currently sit in fourth position on the log had previously won the last three encounters. Shimlas occupy fifth position and will be looking to leapfrog their rivals with a win on the day. 

Undefeated on their home ground the Shimlas will seek to maintain their impressive home form and take advantage of playing to the home crowd. “The boys have been working hard since September last year. They will give it their all to make the play offs and go a few steps further than last year. The team spirit and brotherhood is really strong among the players. They love it when Shimla Park is packed and they will entertain their supporters,” said Andre Tredoux, head coach of FNB UFS Shimlas.

Tredoux has eyes only for the prize, “We need to win this game to get into the top 4 positions, before our last round robin game. All six teams can still reach the play offs, so we are focused on what we need to do and not so much on the other teams, if our processes are good, we have a good chance.” He says synergy was a focal point during last season and nothing has changed. “I expect the boys to play with the same spirit, effort and intensity as last season.” 

“We were a new coaching staff last season, so the players had to go through a process of adjustment. This season we are trying to adapt our game, play smarter rugby, and to keep things fresh. We had thirteen players finish off at the end of last season of which nine got contracts to play professional rugby (eight of those players graduated). The rest graduated or had injuries,” he said.

News Archive

Transformation in higher education discussed at colloquium
2013-05-16

16 May 2013

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The University of the Free State hosted the Higher Education Transformation Colloquium earlier this month on the Bloemfontein Campus.

On Monday 6 May 2013 till Wednesday 8 May 2013 the event brought together a wide range of stakeholders, including some members of university councils; vice-chancellors; academics and researchers; leaders of student formations and presidents of student representative councils; transformation managers; executive directors with responsibility for transformation in various universities, members of the newly established Transformation Oversight Committee and senior representatives from the Department of Higher Education and Training.

The event examined and debated some of the latest research studies and practices on the topic, as well as selected case studies from a number of public universities in South Africa.

Delivering a presentation at the colloquium, Dr Lis Lange, Senior Director of the Directorate for Institutional Research and Academic Planning at the UFS, said transformation in South Africa has been oversimplified and reduced to numbers, and the factors that might accelerate or slow the process have not been taken into account.

Dr Lange was delivering a paper, titled: The knowledge(s) of transformation: an archaeological perspective.

Dr Lange argued that “in the process of translating evolving political arguments into policy making, the intellectual, political and moral elements that shaped the conceptualisation of transformation in the early 1990s in South Africa, were reduced and oversimplified.”

She said crucial aspects of this reduction were the elimination of paradox and contradiction in the concept; the establishment of one accepted register of what transformation was and it is becoming sector-specific or socially blind. This means that the process was narrowed down in the policy texts and in the corresponding implementation strategies to the transformation of higher education, the schools system, the judiciary and the media, without keeping an eye on the structural conditions that can influence it in one way or another.

Dr Lange said the need for accountability further helped with reduction of transformation. “Because government and social institutions are accountable for their promises, transformation had to be measured and demonstrated.”

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