Latest News Archive

Please select Category, Year, and then Month to display items

UFS on track to revolutionise student success and boost sustainability

14 August 2025 | Story Onthatile Tikoe and the Centre for Teaching and Learning | Photo Supplied

CTL — From the left: Dr Jenny Glennie (SAIDE), Gugu Khanye (Director: Student Success – UFS), Prof Matete Madiba (Deputy Vice-Chancellor – UWC), Prof Francois Strydom (UFS Siyaphumelela Lead), and Prof Nthabiseng Ogude (Siyaphumelela Institutional Coach) at the 2025 Siyaphumelela Conference. The group played a key role in advancing conversations around student success, collaboration, and innovation in higher education.

The University of the Free State (UFS) is advancing a transformative approach to student success that positions it to become a national leader in enhancing social mobility. This vision was underscored at the 2025 Siyaphumelela Conference, where the university shared details of its groundbreaking collaboration with the National Institute for Student Success (NISS) at Georgia State University (GSU) in the United States.

Prof Francois Strydom, Senior Director: Centre for Teaching and Learning (CTL), explained that the initiative builds on lessons from GSU’s remarkable achievements. “The success of Georgia State University has been truly inspiring,” he said. “The NISS approach, which focuses on using data to dismantle systemic barriers and improve graduation rates, has transformed outcomes for a predominantly low-income and diverse student body. By contextualising this data-driven model for our environment, the UFS is proud to be the first university on the African continent to implement it.”

Building on proven success

GSU’s success in eliminating equity gaps in retention and completion among different racial groups was achieved through a redesign of its support structures and processes. Drawing on its own established track record of narrowing equity gaps in success rates, the UFS aims to replicate these outcomes in a way that is tailored to its unique context.

At the conference, the UFS Centre for Teaching and Learning (CTL) launched a new national report on student engagement trends and presented papers on a range of topics. These included innovative strategies for improving performance in high-priority modules, the use of predictive analytics to provide proactive student support, and research into gender differences in academic performance and class attendance in a post-COVID world.

Prof Strydom also led an exploratory panel discussion on strengthening collaboration between universities, business, and philanthropy to drive large-scale student success initiatives. “By facilitating a deeper understanding between philanthropic organisations, businesses, and universities, we can develop innovative and impactful approaches to funding and student support,” he said.

Driving innovation and sustainability

The UFS’ contributions at the conference were further reinforced by institutional projects focused on the evidence-based integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into student learning and success. These initiatives reflect a clear commitment to transformation that is both research-led and data-driven.

Looking ahead, Prof Strydom emphasised the opportunity before the institution: “We have a unique opportunity to leverage the lessons learnt from our student success initiatives to guide further research, deploy technology in ways that optimise human connection, and help create responsible societal futures while contributing to the sustainability of our university.”

News Archive

UFS invests in community journalists

2013-12-09

The first group of journalists who completed the Department of Communication Science’s short-learning programme for community journalists. The course was developed by Mrs Willemien Marais (far left) and Mrs Margaret Linström (far right). In front in the middle are Prof Lucius Botes, Dean of the Faculty of the Humanities, and Mr Lumko Mtimde, CEO of the Media Development and Diversity Agency, the sponsor of the programme. Fifth from right is Ms Manana Monareng Wa Stone, Programme Manager of the MDDA.

An investment in our people, our region and our democracy. This is the value of the Department of Communication Science’s short-learning programme for community journalists.

The first 20 community journalists from radio stations and newspapers in the Free State and Northern Cape received their certificates recently after successfully completing the course Basic Journalism Skills for Community Media.

This credit-bearing short-learning programme is fully sponsored by the Media Development and Diversity Agency (MDDA), a statutory body with the aim of developing and promoting community media.

The University of the Free State (UFS) is the first university in South Africa that presents a course of this nature. “It is also the first large-scale formal training of community journalists in the Free State and Northern Cape,” says Mrs Margaret Linström, journalism lecturer in the Department of Communication Science. She developed the course together with another journalism lecturer in the Department, Mrs Willemien Marais. “What distinguishes our programme for similar programmes is the element of mentoring,” explains Marais. Students attend a week-long training session on the Bloemfontein Campus of the UFS. The lecturers then visit all the participating newsrooms to provide further training in terms of the unique challenges of their area. “During the second semester we’ve travelled more than 3000 km to visit radio stations and newspapers as far afield as Springbok and Phuthaditjhaba,” says Linström.

During the certificate ceremony the CEO of the MDDA, Mr Lumko Mtimde, said this partnership with the UFS has the potential to make a tangible difference in communities. “Combined community media reaches the largest target audience in the country. Against this background the importance of training community journalists becomes very clear,” says Mtimde.

The role of community journalists differ from that of journalists who work for state or commercial media. Yet most of these community journalists fall outside the network of formal training, mostly due to a lack of resources and access to training.

“This course has changed my life. I came back as a newborn baby for whom everything is new!” said Mr Setona Selisa from Naledi FM in Senekal. Selisa and his colleague, Mr Teboho Mabuya, received the award for the best participants of the 2013 course.

Back

Economic and Management Sciences

Education

Health Sciences

The Humanities

Law

Natural and Agricultural Sciences

Theology and Religion

Open Distance Learning

Business School

We use cookies to make interactions with our websites and services easy and meaningful. To better understand how they are used, read more about the UFS cookie policy. By continuing to use this site you are giving us your consent to do this.

Accept