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Juanita Burjins joins USAf leadership team, contributing strategic expertise

04 May 2023 | Story Lunga Luthuli | Photo Supplied

Juanita Burjins, Head: Leadership and Development in the Department of Human Resources at the University of the Free State, was recently appointed as a member of the Universities South Africa’s Leadership Management Strategy Group (LMSG). The appointment to the group in April 2023 is a testament and a recognition of Burjin’s leadership and expertise, not only in the field of human resources but also in the higher education sector.

The LMSG is responsible for initiating activities that would allow it to develop evidence-based influences on the work of Higher Education Learner Management (HELM), and to advise the board on the programmatic direction of HELM, including its financial sustainability and identifying opportunities for the growth and expansion of its post-school education and training.

As a member of the USAf Leadership Management Strategy Group – a position Burjins will hold for three years – she will contribute and provide strategic advice to the USAf Board, the Chief Executive, and the Director of Higher Education Leadership and Management, regarding planning, implementation, and monitoring.

Burjins said: “I was nominated by the Skills Development Facilitators Forum; in the group, I will be responsible for engagement and alignment with member universities and other key role players in terms of their leadership and management development needs.”

Beaming with pride, Burjins is looking forward to “working with a group of expert leaders within the higher education sector and contributing to enabling and empowering learning opportunities”.

“I am proud that I could represent the University of the Free State in this capacity and contribute to the stability and effectiveness of institutional leadership and management in the higher education sector. With the opportunity, I am also looking forward to providing strategic advice, advocacy, and tactical programme management support for HELM, and identifying potential national and regional collaborations and partnerships with other universities,” added Burjins.

Burjins believes it is important to have the USAf Leadership Management Strategy Group in higher education, as it provides ‘strategic advice to the USAf Board on the planning, implementation, and monitoring of HELM for the engagement and alignment of member universities in terms of the leadership and development needs as well as the relevance and responsiveness of programme offering and other services in leadership and development.

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Prof. Iain Benson delivers inaugural lecture in UFS's Faculty of Law

2010-10-27

Prof. Shaun de Freitas (left) of the Faculty of Law at the UFS and Prof. Iain Benson.

Prof. Iain T. Benson delivered his inaugural address as Professor Extraordinary in the Department of Constitutional Law and Philosophy of Law in the Faculty of Law at University of the Free State (UFS) faculty last week.

Originally hailing from Canada and currently residing with his family in France, Prof. Benson is an academic with a wealth of experience and expertise in the field of law, especially with regard to the right of conscience and religion. His achievements number many, including being a Senior Associate Counsel at one of Canada’s leading law firms, Miller Thompson LLP; and serving on the Founding Board of the Global Centre for Pluralism.

Apart from his work on leading cases in the United Kingdom and Ireland, Prof. Benson also has strong ties with the law in South Africa. He is part of the Continuity Committee that is responsible for the major undertaking of drawing up the South African Charter of Religious Rights and Freedoms in cooperation with all the major religions in South Africa which, when completed, will be the first use of Section 234 of the South African Constitution.

The title of the inaugural lecture was Living together with Disagreements and the Limits of the Law, which tackled various conscientious and topical issues regarding the complex relationships between the law and religions. Starting off the lecture, Prof. Benson recalled that living together with disagreement is a necessary achievement in free and democratic societies and that differences of belief and opinion should not be resolved by force acceptance of a “one-size fits all” model. Mentioning religion and same-sex marriages, Prof. Benson held these up as issues which reasonable people may disagree on and should hence be respected by the public sphere that is girded round by the law.

Quoting Sophocles’ Antigone, Prof. Benson noted that tensions between the so-called divine and imminent or state laws as in a non-theocratic state have always been with us. He stressed the importance of a wide respect by the law for civic associations in addition to but particularly in relation to religion which guides citizens views about wrong and right beyond matters that are regulated by law.

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