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UFS hosts global summit to advance student well-being

23 July 2025 | Story Tshepo Tsotetsi | Photo Kaleidoscope Studios

Global Student Well-being Summit 2025 — Students from across South Africa and the continent gathered at the University of the Free State’s South Campus for the 2025 Global Student Well-Being Summit, engaging in three days of dialogue, learning, and collaboration.

The University of the Free State (UFS) recently hosted the 2025 Global Student Well-being Summit, bringing together more than 20 institutions from across South Africa and the African continent. The three-day event, which took place from 16 to 18 July at the UFS South Campus, was themed ‘Co-Creating Student Well-being Strategies from the Student’s Perspective’ and positioned students at the centre of the conversation on well-being in higher education.

Universities such as the University of Zambia, National University of Lesotho, University of Namibia, the international Limkokwing University of Creative Technology, and 15 South African universities were among those represented by students, academics, institutional leaders, and wellness experts. Together, they tackled pressing issues related to mental health, academic pressure, inclusion, identity, and care in university spaces.

Building a culture of well-being and collaboration

“We came here to address the critical issues that our students are facing, especially in relation to student well-being,” said Dr Temba Hlasho, Executive Director of Student Affairs at UFS, in his opening remarks. “In today’s fast-paced and demanding academic landscape, student well-being is essential for academic success, personal growth, and future career prospects.”

The summit’s programme included plenaries and parallel sessions covering a broad range of topics such as healthy masculinity, transactional sex, stigma and discrimination, and the struggles of minority groups in higher education. These sessions were led by a combination of students and staff, reflecting the summit’s commitment to co-creation.

In a recorded address, UFS Vice-Chancellor and Principal Prof Hester C. Klopper highlighted the need for a collective response to student well-being across institutions and national borders. “They are part of a shared human experience that demands a shared response,” she said. “Students are not merely receivers of academic knowledge – they are whole human beings… carrying hopes and fears, dreams and anxieties.”

Prof Klopper also pointed to the need for honesty and vulnerability in the sector. “We should not be scared to fail – as long as we fail forward,” she said, adding that innovation in student support comes not only from sharing best practices but from learning what doesn’t work.

Student participants described the summit as eye-opening and deeply personal. “I realised that mental health is crucial, serving as the driving force behind daily functioning,” said Olwethu Sigcu, a BCom in Economics and Finance (extended) student from the UFS Bloemfontein Campus. “I previously overlooked its significance, but the summit motivated me to adopt a more comprehensive approach to health – considering physical, mental, and spiritual well-being.”

Institutional Student Representative Council President Mpho Maloka said the experience offered both leadership growth and personal transformation. “As a young woman navigating complex spaces, I was given an opportunity to grow that I didn’t even know I needed,” she said. “This summit is not just another checkbox on a list of student initiatives – it represents a culture.”

Dr Hlasho also noted that the outcomes of the summit align with several United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, in particular SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-being), SDG 4 (Quality Education), and SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals). He encouraged students to lead the shift towards healthier, more inclusive communities, stressing the need for long-term impact driven by young people.

The summit closed with a clear message: student well-being is not a side programme but is foundational to academic success and meaningful social change. And it must be co-created with students, not for them.

News Archive

‘Is the South African university curriculum ‘colonial'?’ asks Prof Jansen

2017-11-24

Description: Jansen readmore Tags: Prof Jonathan Jansen, colonial, university curriculum, western knowledge

From left; Prof Corli Witthuhn, Vice-Rector: Research; former Rector and Vice-
Chancellor of the UFS, Prof Jonathan Jansen; Prof Michael Levitt, and
Prof Francis Petersen at the celebration lecture at the UFS.
Photo: Johan Roux

One of the critical issues that emerged from the South African student protests during 2015 and 2016 was a demand for the decolonisation of university curriculums.

A senior professor at the Stellenbosch University, Prof Jonathan Jansen, said the number of people, including academics, who joined the cause without adequately interrogating the language of this protest, was astonishing. “The role of social scientists is to investigate new ideas … when something is presented to the world as truth.” Prof Jansen was speaking during a celebration lecture at the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein on 15 November 2017.

Large amount of knowledge not African
He said the accusation is correct to a limited degree. “The objection, in essence, is against the centring of Western, and especially European knowledge, in institutional curricula.” There is no doubt that most of what constitutes curriculum knowledge in South African universities, and in universities around the world, derive from the West. “The major theories and theorists, the methodologists and methods are disproportionally situated outside of the developing world,” Prof Jansen said.

The dilemma is, how will South Africa and the continent change the locus of knowledge production, considering the deteriorating state of public universities? “In the absence of vibrant, original, and creative knowledge production systems in Africa and South Africa, where will this African-centred or African-led curriculum theory come from,” Jansen asked. He says the re-centring of a curriculum needs scholars with significant post-doctoral experiences that are rooted in the study of education and endowed with the critical independence of thought. “South Africa's universities are not places where scholars can think. South African universities’ current primary occupation is security and police dogs,” Prof Jansen said.

Collaboration between African and Western scholars
“Despite the challenges, not everything was stuck in the past,” Prof Jansen said. South African scholars now lead major research programmes in the country intellectually. The common thread between these projects is that the content is African in the subjects of study, and the work reflects collaboration with academics in the rest of the world. These research projects attract postgraduate students from the West, and the research increasingly affects curriculum transformations across university departments. There is also an ongoing shift in the locus of authority for knowledge production within leading universities in South Africa. Prof Jansen feels a significant problem that is being ignored in the curriculum debate, is the concern about the knowledge of the future. How does South Africa prepare its young for the opportunities provided by the groundswell of technological innovation? “In other parts of the world, school children are learning coding, artificial intelligence, and automation on a large scale. They are introduced to neuroscience and applied mathematics,” he said.

Prof Jansen said, in contrast, in South Africa the debate focuses on the merits of mathematics literacy, and what to do with dead people’s statues.

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