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05 August 2024 | Story Precious Shamase | Photo Yonela Vimba
commuter lounge Qwaqwa Campus
The new commuter lounge is designed to provide off-campus students with a comfortable and conducive environment for studying, socialising, and relaxation.

The University of the Free State (UFS) Qwaqwa Campus recently celebrated a significant milestone with the preliminary opening of its new commuter lounge. This dedicated space is designed to provide off-campus students with a comfortable and conducive environment for study, socialising, and relaxation.

A diverse crowd gathered to witness the historic event, including university staff and students from the off-campus community.

In his opening remarks, Vice-Principal: Support Services, Teboho Manchu, expressed his enthusiasm for the project. He highlighted the challenges previously faced by off-campus students who lacked adequate study spaces on campus. The new commuter lounge addresses this issue by offering a welcoming environment where students can connect, collaborate, and engage in intellectual discourse.

Quintin Koetaan, Senior Director: Housing and Residence Affairs, shared insights into the journey of bringing the lounge to fruition. He emphasised the collaborative efforts of various stakeholders and expressed gratitude to Coke for its generous sponsorship through the Alumni Office. The lounge also features a laundry facility, a valuable addition for students residing off campus. “Sitting here today really gives me goosebumps, because it is a dream come true for quite a number of people. This student lounge reflects an identity of what it is to be a Kovsie. It reflects us as the university, which is underpinned by the principles of diversity and accessibility. We want to give every one of our students access to a facility they can feel proud of, a facility where intellectual engagement can happen outside of class. This is a dream in terms of Vision 130, which demands of us to create these kinds of spaces that allow for positive interaction to encourage academic success,” expounded Koetaan.

A member of the Student Representative Council (SRC), Potela Zimvo, expressed the SRC’s appreciation for the new facility. He emphasised that the commuter lounge symbolises the university's commitment to inclusivity and support for all students, regardless of their residence status. The lounge is expected to foster a strong sense of community among commuter students and provide a much-needed space for social interaction and academic engagement. “To the university and campus management, thank you for recognising this initiative and providing the necessary resources. We hope that this place will become a central hub for our commuter students and that it will establish a sense of belonging for them. We appreciate the fact that this commuter lounge is equipped with laundry facilities, which will be helpful to our commuter students amid the water and electricity crisis that the Qwaqwa community faces,” said Zimvo.

The official opening ceremony of the commuter lounge is scheduled for later in the year, when it will be officially opened by the Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of the Free State, Prof Francis Petersen. However, the university has decided to make the facility available to students immediately to allow them to benefit from the amenities.

This new commuter lounge is a testament to the university's dedication to creating an inclusive and supportive campus environment for all students. It is a space where students can thrive academically and socially, contributing to their overall university experience.

News Archive

Mellon Foundation awards R10 million research grant to Trauma, Forgiveness and Reconciliation Studies
2015-02-20

Prof Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, Senior Research Professor in Trauma, Forgiveness and Reconciliation Studies, and Dr Saleem Badat, Programme Director at the Mellon Foundation.
Photo: Johan Roux

Through her profound insight, vast experience, and unfaltering belief in humanity, Prof Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, has secured a R10 million grant from one of the world’s most prestigious foundations funding human sciences research.

“This is one of the biggest grants that the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded to a university”, said Dr Saleem Badat, Program Director: International Higher Education and Strategic Projects at the Mellon Foundation. Prof Badat attended the press event that took place on 16 February 2015 on our Bloemfontein Campus.

UFS Trauma, Forgiveness, and Reconciliation Studies, spearheaded by Prof Gobodo-Madikizela, will manage the research project.

Prof Jonathan Jansen, Vice-Chancellor and Rector of the UFS, expressed great excitement “about this particular grant and the subject on which it focuses is so incredibly timely and germane to our own situation.”

Trauma, Memory and Representations of the Past: Transforming Scholarship in the Humanities and Arts

This new-found partnership between the Mellon Foundation and the UFS will enable a five-year research programme. The focus area of this initiative will be ‘Trauma, Memory and Representations of the Past: Transforming Scholarship in the Humanities and Arts’.

The research will pivot specifically around the question of how trauma is transmitted from one generation to the next. “South Africa lends itself to these questions,” Prof Gobodo-Madikizela said, “because we are now dealing with a generation of young people who were born after the traumas of the past.” These past experiences, though, are “passed on to the younger generation and become their own stories and narratives as if they themselves experienced the traumas directly.”

“This is an investment in how we can in fact create a different kind of community,” Prof Jansen said, “in which we eventually recognise each other – not by the accident of our skin, but by that elusive sense of a common humanity.”

Arts and theatre

Other aspects critical to this study are the inclusion of the arts and theatre. Many people have great difficulty in expressing their experiences of trauma in the spoken word. The arts and theatre provide an ideal platform to engage the public and stimulate conversation. As an example of the power these platforms possess, Prof Gobodo-Madikizela highlighted the success of the Johannes Stegmann Art Gallery – situated on the Bloemfontein Campus and curated by Angela de Jesus – in engaging the public in very productive ways.

Participants

Some of the artists, directors and scholars who will join in this project include:

• Lara Foot-Newton, Director/Playwright
• Sue Williamson, Activist Artist
• Angela de Jesus, Visual Artist/Curator
• Dr Buhle Zuma, Social Psychology Research
• Dr Shose Khessi, Social Psychology Research
• Prof Tamara Shefer, Women’s and Gender Studies
• Prof Kopano Ratele, Gender/Men and Masculinities
• Prof Jan Coetzee, Sociology of Developing Societies
• Prof Helene Strauss, Literary and Cultural Studies

New intellectual frontiers

“There is an aspiration in this proposal,” Dr Saleem Badat said. “We were born through this pain of colonialism and apartheid; we even went through the TRC. Our scholars in this country, our universities, should be at the forefront of this research. This is not research we can leave to the institutions in the north.”

Prof Gobodo-Madikizela agreed. “The overarching theme of this work is new knowledge production, focusing on the experiences in South Africa as experiences that can teach us something new.”

This will serve not only South Africa, but can also establish support for, and inform, countries facing similar dilemmas. In fact, “any part of the world in which genocide and murder and racism remains as legacies from the past,” Dr Badat said.

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