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31 January 2024 | Story Anthony Mthembu | Photo Supplied
Michelle de Lange
Michelle De Lange: The winner of the ‘Elite University Educator’ award announced at the first AICPA & CIMA CGMA Professional Awards Africa ceremony.

The University of the Free State (UFS) has proudly clinched two prestigious awards at the inaugural Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA) Leadership Award ceremony. Organised by the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants, comprising AICPA and CIMA, this event recognises the outstanding contributions to the finance and accounting industry on the continent.

Top university accolade

UFS secured the coveted CGMA Leadership Award for ‘Excellent University Partner (Top 10 in Africa).’ This accolade underscores the institution's commitment to advancing the finance and accounting sector. The presentation took place at the awards ceremony held in Johannesburg on 24 November 2023, marking a significant achievement for the UFS.

Prof Frans Prinsloo, Vice-Dean of Learning, Teaching, Innovation, and Digitalisation in the Economic and Management Sciences (EMS) Faculty at the UFS, views the award as a testament to the alignment of the academic programmes with the standards of leading professional accountancy bodies in South Africa, including the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA).

Prinsloo stated, “We have worked diligently to align our academic programmes with the requirements of key potential professional bodies, positioning ourselves as an educator of choice. This recognition, alongside our other accreditations, confirms our success in achieving this goal.”

A global educator recognised

Further enhancing the UFS’s recognition, Michelle de Lange, Lecturer in the School of Accountancy and Programme Coordinator of the B.Com Honours in Management Accounting, received the ‘Elite University Educator of the Year Award’ in the CGMA Leadership Award category. Nominated by her students and colleagues, De Lange expressed her honour and surprise at winning, highlighting her commitment to delivering valuable content to her students.

De Lange shared her perspective, stating, “To compete against phenomenal educators was a privilege, and winning signifies that my efforts are making a positive impact on students and colleagues alike.”

According to Prinsloo and De Lange, these accolades affirm the institution’s dedication to producing top-class accountancy and finance graduates.

News Archive

Understanding the nature of prominence
2014-03-14

 

What did Hendrik Verwoerd and Steve Biko have in common? Or perhaps Johannes Kerkorrel and Brenda Fassie?

“They all possessed a certain natural predisposition to prominence,” says Prof Paul Fouche, reseacher in psychobiography at the University of the Free State’s Department of Psychology.

Prof Fouche and a team of researchers from other South African universities released findings on psychobiographical studies done on personalities that played a great role in our history.

The studies show that notable historical figures were very often prolific readers with a passion for literature since childhood. Generally, they also had a great love for nature and a sense of the sacredness of it, as well as a love for the cosmos.

The study further reveals that many of them were forced to take up leadership roles in the family from a very young age and were driven to succeed in order to take care of their own.

In many of these cases, there was a strong partner who supported the leader while they went about the business of governing their world.

Psychobiography is the systematic and descriptively-rich case study of renowned, enigmatic or even contentious individuals in socio-historical contexts within a psychological frame of reference. Over the past decade, psychobiography has become an established research genre and a methodology used by various academics and scholars in the field of life history research.

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