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UFS Modular Lecture Building gets national recognition

11 May 2023 | Story Samkelo Fetile | Photo iFlair Photography

The University of the Free State’s (UFS) Modular Lecture Building on its Bloemfontein Campus recently received a National Merit Award from the South African Institute of Architects (SAIA). The awards were announced at the 2021/2022 Corobrik SAIA Awards of Merit and Awards for Excellence ceremony in Johannesburg.

The multi-functional Modular Lecture Building, considered a hub for innovative learning, was designed by Roodt Architects in partnership with GXY Architects.

The adjudication panel received a total of 42 architectural projects from around the country, including infrastructure developments in the public and private sector. The SAIA Awards programme is structured over a two-year period and is conducted in two stages. In stage one regional awards for architecture are presented by the nine regional institutes affiliated to SAIA. In stage two the winning regional projects that are consequently entered into the national awards receive either a Commendation, an Award of Merit, and/or an Award for Excellence, which recognises exceptional achievement in the field of architecture.

In their citation the adjudicators noted that the Modular Lecture Building sets a benchmark for rational planning and technical efficiency and helps complete the campus urban framework through its placing and material choices.

Multi-functional spaces for students

Nico Janse van Rensburg, Senior Director at UFS University Estates, said the recognition is a testament to the UFS’s aspirations to renew, rejuvenate, regenerate, and revisit facilities and infrastructure.

“This award proves that excellence can be achieved with a reasonable set budget,” Janse van Rensburg said. “Energy efficiency and green building principles can be achieved by careful planning and teamwork.”

The Modular Lecture Building offers a variety of much-needed flexible teaching and learning spaces. “I have been using the facilities in this building for two years now, and I can say the building is much more spacious and conducive to studying,” said Hymne Spies, a third-year BSc student majoring in biochemistry and genetics. “The many plugs make it more efficient for studying, as one can plug in his or her laptop. There is also a nice computer lab for us to make use of.”

The UFS is proud that the construction of this facility forms part of a bigger endeavour – to create a cohesive campus identity that improves core business and to further extend its innovation and excellence as per its Vision 130.

Take a tour of the new Modular Lecturing Space and Assessment Centre Building:

News Archive

Prestige Scholar hosts Prof John Helliwell of Manchester University

2015-12-08

From left is Prof John R. Helliwell (School of Chemistry, University of Manchester), Dr Madeleine Helliwell (School of Chemistry, University of Manchester), Prof Andre Roodt (Department of Chemistry, University of the Free State) and Dr Alice Brink (Department of Chemistry, University of the Free State).
Photo: Steven Collett

At the invitation of Dr Alice Brink of the Department of Chemistry, Prof John Helliwell, the 2015 Max Perutz Prize winner, and his wife, Dr Madeleine Helliwell, visited the University of the Free State (UFS).
The Helliwells, both chemists of note, took part in a series of lectures and exchanges on the Bloemfontein and Qwaqwa Campuses.
This visit from 9-19 November 2015 was the consequence of Dr Brink’s participation in the Vice-Chancellor’s Prestige Scholars Programme (PSP) initiative to encourage the broadening of the international footprint of the next generation of scholars in the academy.

Two year collaboration

Dr Brink and Prof Helliwell from Manchester University have a standing collaboration going back two years. Dr Brink, an NRF Thuthuka grant holder and a member of the PSP since 2013, has spent almost eight months in Manchester, collaborating with Prof Helliwell on her study of the successful interaction of rhenium tricarbonyl complexes with proteins determined via protein crystallography.
Their collaboration resulted from the close association of Prof Helliwell and Prof Andre Roodt from the UFS Department of Chemistry, both former presidents of the European Crystallographic Association.

Sharing academic expertise

Prof Helliwell, the 2014 American Crystallographic Association Patterson Award winner for his “pioneering contributions to the global development of the instrumentation, methods and applications of synchrotron radiation in macromolecular crystallography”, gave three lectures in the Department of Chemistry, two on the Boemfontein Campus, and the other on the Qwaqwa Campus on 13 November 2015.

Dr Helliwell, former co-editor of the Acta Crystallographica Section C: Crystal Structure Communications journal, consulted with postgraduate students from the Departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry.

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