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UFS wins top awards at the 2024 Mace Excellence Awards

05 December 2024 | Story Dr Cindé Greyling | Photo Kaleidoscope

MACE Winners 2024 — From left to right: Burneline Kaars (Head: Employee Wellness and Organisational Development), Dr WP Wahl (Student Life Director), Linda Greyling (Senior Officer: Special Projects, Student Recruitment Services), Gerben Van Niekerk (Senior Officer: Kovsie Support Services), Malia Maranyane (Senior Officer: Undergraduate Marketing, Student Recruitment Services), Nomonde Mbadi (Student Recruitment Services Director), and Susan Van Jaarsveld (Senior Director: Human Resources).

On 28 November 2024, the University of the Free State (UFS) did it again – reigned as champions at the annual Marketing, Advancement and Communication in Education (MACE) Excellence Awards and walking away with two of the top awards: the MACE Award for Outstanding Research and the Severus Cerff Award for Consistent Excellence.

KovsieX was named the overall winner of the MACE Award for Outstanding Research. This award is made to the entry with the highest score in research, clearly demonstrating how research has supported the strategic objectives of the institution and the project. KovsieX is a multiplatform approach designed to leverage the strengths of diverse media channels. This digitalisation aligns with Vision 130, leveraging emerging technologies to enhance teaching and learning quality and efficiency of non-academic support structures and systems.

The UFS’ entries were of such high quality that the university won the sought-after Severus Cerff Award for Consistent Excellence. This award is based on the number of entries entered by an institution and the number and level of those entries winning awards. The award is therefore made to the institution with the highest success ratio.

Furthermore, the UFS Matriculant of the Year event received a Silver Award – entries scoring 5.75 or higher earn a Silver Award, placing this event among some of the top achievers in the events category. Three UFS entries received Gold Awards and were the winners in their respective categories: KovsieChat (Digital Channels), 2024 Women’s Day Breakfast (Events), and KovsieX (Stakeholder Engagement Campaigns). This is a magnificent achievement for the UFS.

"Winning a MACE award at this early stage is proof that KovsieX is not just meeting national standards – it’s setting them. If we can achieve this level of excellence now, imagine how we’ll compete on the global stage when the project is fully realised,” says Gerben van Niekerk, Student Media Manager.

Lacea Loader, Senior Director: Communication and Marketing and Coordinator of the MACE Excellence Awards, explained that a record number of entries were received for the Excellence Awards this year. “We are ecstatic about the direction of communication at the UFS and that the university has been able to maintain the quality of its entries in recent years,” says Loader.

The MACE Excellence Awards takes place annually as part of the MACE National Conference, recognising and celebrating excellence and the achievements of specialists and practitioners in marketing, advancement, and communication in the higher-education sector. This year, the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT) hosted the conference from 27 to 28 November 2024.

In 2023, the UFS won 11 awards, including the Chairperson’s Award of Excellence.

News Archive

“Arts Festival” Rally promises to be great fun!

2008-06-17

The annual Amazing Rainbow Rally, presented by the University of the Free State’s (UFS) Department of Paediatrics and Child Health and UFS Marketing, will take place on Friday, 11 July 2008 during the Volksblad Arts Festival on the Main Campus in Bloemfontein.

Teams will start at 12:00 at the Protea Hotel in Nelson Mandela Drive, before proceeding to the campus. This year’s rally will have a new twist, namely that all the checkpoints will be on the campus.

Corporate companies in Bloemfontein and departments at the UFS may still enter as there is still place for four teams. A team consists of two team members who must work together to complete a route with various checkpoints. Teams must complete tasks at every checkpoint to be able to proceed to the next checkpoint. The team, who finishes first after having successfully completed all the tasks, is the winner. Last year, Pieter Skein and Steyn Strauss of Naudés Attorneys were the winners of the rally.

The “Arts Festival” Rally promises to challenge teams physically, mentally and even artistically. Festival goers will also have the opportunity to see how their favourite team is doing.

The rally will be presented for the fourth time in 2008. The main goal of this year’s rally is to raise funds for the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health’s “Beds of Hope” Campaign. This campaign seeks to increase the number of intensive care beds in the paediatric and neonatal wards. Currently, around 250 children and babies in central South Africa cannot receive the life-saving care they need because of a lack of facilities.

Enquiries about the rally can be directed to Ms Adéle van Aswegen at 051 401 3535 or Ms Ilse Smalberger at 051 401 2415.

Media Release
Issued by: Lacea Loader
Assistant Director: Media Liaison
Tel: 051 401 2584
Cell: 083 645 2454
E-mail: loaderl.stg@ufs.ac.za
17 June 2008

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