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The primary objective of this research was to evaluate long-term user acceptability of menstrual cups in a student population in South Africa. A cohort of female students aged 18–24 years attending 10 further education institutions including 22 campus sites in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, were offered menstrual cups after receiving education and training in their use. The students were followed for up to 12 months to assess menstrual cup acceptability, user experiences and continuation. A total of 509 students were enrolled. Disposable pads were the primary menstrual hygiene product used in the 3 months prior to the baseline interview (95.5%, n = 486), and 8.1% (n = 41) of students reported that they had used toilet paper or newspapers. Of the 463 (91%) students interviewed at 1 month follow-up, 86% reported that they had tried to use the menstrual cup. There was mixed reporting on ease of insertion and removal on first use. Of those who attempted use, half (49.5%, n = 197) reported that inserting the menstrual cup on first use was very easy or quite easy. Of those who did not find it easy, 80% reported that two to three insertions were required to achieve comfort. A maximum of five insertions was mentioned to achieve comfort. The majority who had used the cup (>90%) reported they would continue to use it at each follow-up visit. The menstrual cup was well accepted among this student population and should be considered as a cost-effective and environmentally sustainable option in menstrual health management initiatives in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: There has been a steady increase in the number of students with disabilities (SWD) in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in South Africa, with a significant number of students having visual disabilities. Equal access remains a key challenge in the classroom setting, thus emphasising a significant gap. Objectives: This paper capitalised on the significance of this gap and examined the potential of Universal Design of Instruction (UDI) to promote equal access for students with visual disabilities (SWVDs) in the classroom within a university setting in order to maximise learning outcomes. Method: The study was conducted at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), which had approximately 204 SWVDs. This paper draws primarily on the quantitative component of the study. Data collection entailed distributing a questionnaire to all SWVDs. Analysis was conducted using SPSS 21, which produced descriptive and inferential statistics. The theoretical framework of Sen's Capability Approach in line with the Social Model of Disability was applied. Results: Findings indicated a lack of UDI in the classroom with very little compliance to all principles, resulting in increased challenges in teaching and learning for SWVDs. The incorporation of UDI in the classroom does have a positive correlation with learning outcomes. Conclusion: The incorporation of UDI principles can offer a potential design for easier access to teaching and learning to enhance and maximise learning outcomes; alleviate access challenges in the classroom; and address the negative experiences thereof for SWVDs. Contribution: The study adds value to the scarce body of knowledge on UDI in the classroom for university SWVDs from a learning enhancement perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors of this paper adopted a transformative framework in this article to examine how the legacy of apartheid continues to manifest within higher education in South Africa. In particular, the authors analyzed (a) how mainstream mentoring knowledge of 'black' and 'marginalized' people have influenced mentoring in post-apartheid South Africa; (b) varied ways in which mentoring initiatives and programs have been silenced and ignored previously marginalized voices through the application of apartheid mentoring knowledge, and (c) shared how the mentors/lecturers and students show and tell their stories about the demands of mentoring and the emphasis of contextual and responsive mentoring for the previously marginalized people in higher education in South Africa. The shortage of mentoring has been cited as a crucial reason for women's lack of advancement in leadership. Implications for advancing transformation through mentoring in higher education in South Africa are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the current debates, anxieties, and perceptions around the idea of scholarly artistic research within doctoral studies, internationally and in South Africa. A common point of contention, both in South Africa and in the international arena, is the reluctance within institutional structures and external bodies to accept artmaking as research and the creative production or artifact as a legitimate component of the research output. Creative practice is permissible at the doctoral level of study but usually research or new knowledge that emerges from such practice is evaluated and analyzed through the lens of textual research. The unwillingness to qualify practice as autonomous research is coupled with its awkward positioning in the humanities as a kind of study secondary to and distinct from that associated with scientific research methodology. This discussion engages with policies, developments, debates, and discourse around practice-based doctoral study in South African and globally, with the hope of presenting a comprehensive overview of the current state of doctoral level artistic research. Moreover, in drawing on international discourse and precedents the study proposes some guidelines, parameters and methodological approaches that can contribute to the understanding and development of doctoral artistic research in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the understanding that universities play multiple social purposes, we aimed to provide an estimation of the economic impact of the public universities in South Africa. Using models described in the literature, we estimated economic benefits from four university activities -- university exports, research at universities, the production of graduates and universities as business entities. Comparative analysis shows that, as an economic sector, Higher Education contributes more to South Africa's gross value added than other economic sectors such as Wood and Wood Products, Textiles, Clothing and Leather Goods, or Paper and Paper Products. It is comparable to sectors such as Gold Mining, and Beverages and Tobacco. Taking into account a number of assumptions, which are explained in the text, for 2018 the total economic impact was estimated at about ZAR513 billion. Governmental expenditure on higher education in that year was ZAR66 billion. These figures produce a cost--benefit ratio for the sector of 1 : 7.7, considering only these four university activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learning outcomes are predominantly framed in narrow and measurable terms, with students as decontextualised learners. As an alternative, the paper outlines a capabilitarian approach, building a four-dimensional matrix for reconceptualising learning outcomes. It is made up of a varied, multi-dimensional set of opportunities, processes and outcomes to enable students to flourish and become people who can live fulfilling and connected lives in and beyond higher education. The matrix dimensions are made up of a capability set, corresponding functionings, material resources and conversion processes, underpinned by Constitutional and human development values. The paper draws on a project on higher education outcomes in South Africa, especially the longitudinal life history data. It makes the case for a reparative futures orientation which might dismantle the colonial-apartheid past and present, and outlines key capabilitarian concepts. The social and higher education context is sketched, followed by a focus on the capability set and what data supports its value to students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the university, industry and government (UIG) research and development (R&D) collaborations that academia in South African higher education institutions (HEIs) with clothing-related programmes engage in. In the research on which the paper is based, Fashion, Consumer Science, Textiles and Clothing Management academia were purposively sampled to gather data regarding the UIG R&D collaborations. Data collection was conducted through an online questionnaire. Descriptive statistics were employed to analyze data and present results in figures and graphs. Findings show that majority surveyed academia had never been involved in UIG R&D collaborations with any government levels, the clothing, textiles, leather and footwear (CTLF) industry or other clothing related organizations. The paper concludes that the ability of surveyed academia to produce 'relevant' new knowledge may be limited due to under developed UIG R&D collaborations. The likelihood of the surveyed clothing-related programmes producing graduates with 'relevant skills' for a changing world may also be negatively impacted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: There has been a steady increase in the number of students with disabilities (SWD) in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in South Africa, with a significant number of students having visual disabilities. Equal access remains a key challenge in the classroom setting, thus emphasising a significant gap. Objectives: This paper capitalised on the significance of this gap and examined the potential of Universal Design of Instruction (UDI) to promote equal access for students with visual disabilities (SWVDs) in the classroom within a university setting in order to maximise learning outcomes. Method: The study was conducted at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), which had approximately 204 SWVDs. This paper draws primarily on the quantitative component of the study. Data collection entailed distributing a questionnaire to all SWVDs. Analysis was conducted using SPSS 21, which produced descriptive and inferential statistics. The theoretical framework of Sen's Capability Approach in line with the Social Model of Disability was applied. Results: Findings indicated a lack of UDI in the classroom with very little compliance to all principles, resulting in increased challenges in teaching and learning for SWVDs. The incorporation of UDI in the classroom does have a positive correlation with learning outcomes. Conclusion: The incorporation of UDI principles can offer a potential design for easier access to teaching and learning to enhance and maximise learning outcomes; alleviate access challenges in the classroom; and address the negative experiences thereof for SWVDs. Contribution: The study adds value to the scarce body of knowledge on UDI in the classroom for university SWVDs from a learning enhancement perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This concept note was produced for a symposium held under the banner of Critical University Studies – South Africa (CUS-SA) at the University of Johannesburg in August 2022. The opening plenary session was addressed by Profs. Premesh Lalu, Sarah Mosoetsa and Sarah Nuttall. A summary of a paper prepared for this symposium by Michael Peters on the university in techno-rational times was presented as part of the panel. The rest of the symposium featured critical discussion in response to this concept note and presentations of potential chapter contributions for a book on the theme. The concept note is followed below by six responses by South African higher education scholars in response to Michael Peters' and the CUS-SA concept note. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1994, South Africa's political governance changed from being a White minority-controlled apartheid state to a democracy—a relatively peaceful transition underpinned by a social cohesion and reconciliation ideology, namely, that all (both perpetrators and the oppressed) were victims requiring healing in the new proverbial "rainbow nation." Reconciling racial fractures, anti-Blackness and unevenness of the higher education landscape, however, remains elusive. In this paper, we engage narrative inquiry to reflect as academics of color on our experiences in the last two and a half decades, of negotiating a mutating higher education space still haunted by residual racial hegemony and anti-Blackness in almost every sphere of the fraternity. We draw on Grosfoguel's Fanonian-inspired constructs, namely, the "zones of being and non-being" and his conception of racism as beyond mere color racism but as a "dehumanization related to the materiality of domination." We argue that color racism as it relates to the traditional apartheid plantation model has morphed into a neoliberal plantation in the higher education space with new colonial masters (managerial elites in the zone of being) and that Black students and Black academics continue to experience the university as alien as they assimilate hegemonic western Eurocentric culture and epistemology. We consider how we might stand in the cracks, look through and prise open such cracks in agentic contemplation of a resistance to emerging new forms of racism and anti-Blackness that present in South African higher education and how we might respond to student activism (the #RhodesMustFall movement) that calls for curriculum transformation and decolonization. An agenda at risk of subversion by the neoliberal grand narrative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The national #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall student protests of 2015-2016 at universities across South Africa foregrounded the need for the transformation, decolonisation, redress and Africanisation of the country's higher education institutions. One of the ways that Stellenbosch University (SU) has endeavoured to address transformation-related challenges linked to symbols and names is with the Visual Redress Project, whose aim is to change the visual landscape of the university's campuses. This paper explores the reactions of students and staff to initiatives carried out thus far by the Visual Redress project on SU's Stellenbosch campus. It attempts to contribute to the discourse around the transformation of higher education in South Africa through a look at how social cohesion and the sharing of stories and identities could be achieved on SU's campus through visual redress. It draws upon and expands on the existing research on visual redress conducted at the University (Fataar & Costandius, 2021; Costandius et al., 2020; Clarke & Costandius, 2019). The paper aims not only to provide insight into SU's transformation efforts but to also use these responses and reactions to potentially inform future transformation imperatives and redress initiatives in particular on this and other campuses locally and globally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper explores the contributions of undergraduate university education to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)' goals and development outcomes, proposing a normative capability-based approach oriented to human development. The approach is aligned with a developmental model of the university and development policy in sub-Saharan Africa and South Africa, where the study is located. It draws empirically from a four and a half year mixed-methods research project conducted with low-income, mostly rural students at five historically diverse universities in South Africa. The paper presents a justification for using the capability approach, and outlines the rationale and methodology for synthesising a specific capability set generated by theorising and empirical data. A set of corresponding functioning indicators offers an expansive approach to understanding 'learning outcomes' in contrast to dominant neoliberal approaches that seek quantification and efficiency, overlooking what cannot be easily measured. An indicative sketch of university arrangements required to advance and evaluate each functioning for development outcomes is then outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A quarter of a century after South Africa's transition to democracy, the rhetoric of 'transformation' remains firmly ingrained in its higher education policy and discourse. In many of the reviews, reports, proposals, and frameworks on the transformation of the South African university system, one thing stands out: an oversupply of rhetoric and a dearth of empirical data. This article is a direct response to how infrequently data has been used and seeks to reveal the actual quantum of change, albeit with a focus on an admittedly singular element on the transformation spectrum but one which nevertheless preoccupies South Africans: equity (or race). The evidence presented in the paper shows that the absence of a clear articulation of transformation, accompanied by a lack of indicators and targets to track progress over time, hinders the progression of the discourse to equally important dimensions of performance such as efficiency, success and productivity—all of which are critical in determining the university's role in national development. The paper goes on to show that based on the data available, the public university system in South Africa is transforming given the increases over time in the number of black students and staff. However, without a clearly articulated idea of what constitutes change, one cannot claim a transformed system, and the political narrative of no transformation is likely to prevail. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The focus of this paper is on the contestations and dilemmas emergent in the higher education curriculum in a context of increasing processes of unbundling, digitisation and marketisation. The paper explores the notion of contestation through the theoretical lens of Cultural-Historical Activity Theory. It points to illustrative examples of this contestation from empirical data drawn from stakeholder research in South African higher education. The paper grapples with understandings of the concept of curriculum and argues how these have been shaped by – and are shaping – emergent meanings of the curriculum in an unbundling context. The argument is that these emergent meanings are a function of different explicit and tacit understandings of curriculum and what higher education offers to students. These understandings are deepened or modified by processes of unbundling. Empirical data from the research study show these understandings to be forming against the backdrop of powerful cultural and agentic forces and players. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes online teaching and learning strategies and the challenges involved in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. Three years on in the pandemic, universities have struggled with the challenges faced by the move from traditional learning to online teaching and learning. Instructional strategies have advanced rapidly given the epidemic's realities of isolation, separation, and distance but not all of them have been successful. A cause for concern is that the well documented benefits of online learning become diminished as the negativities of online learning become more obvious. For example, technological difficulties are becoming more prevalent, as inadequate technical skill sets and levels as well as incompatible teaching styles. Furthermore, a lack of engagement between students and instructors, and poor communication further hampered online learning. From the view of academic staff developers, this study analyzes online learning strategies and provides recommendations for lecturers to take heed of in a world designed on Covid-19 restrictions. The study is important for both lecturers and students struggling with online learning and institutional wellbeing as it reflects on post-Covid dynamics. Based in South Africa, the study provides a Pan-African perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Technology acceptance models have been used in the higher education context to understand students' acceptance of various learning technologies. Not only was the use of e-learning technologies heightened during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the shift to predominantly online teaching and learning was abrupt. It has become clear that acceptance of e-learning technology will be crucial for higher education in a post-COVID-19 world. Thus, the purpose of this study was to determine the acceptance of e-learning applications by accounting students at residential universities in South Africa. The Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT2) was adapted for this study to examine the relevance of its constructs in understanding students' intent to use e-learning applications. Accounting students registered at four South African universities completed an electronic questionnaire (n = 1 864). Structural Equation Modelling using the Partial Least Squares method was used to test the hypothesised relationships. The findings indicate that performance expectancy, social influence, facilitating conditions, and habit have a significant relationship with behavioural intention to use e-learning applications. However, gender, academic performance, and level of study do not have a significant moderating effect on these relationships. The study reported in this paper contributes to technology acceptance research by testing the UTAUT2 model in a cross-institutional context with a larger sample size than used in similar studies. Furthermore, it has practical value for higher education policymakers, institutions, and lecturers in their attempts to adapt to blended and online learning models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The direct crediting of book allowances to student accounts was, among other reasons, underpinned by the belief that students would be able to substitute prescribed study material with online content. The article attempts to understand if the local open educational resources (OER) funding policy environment was prepared for this significant transformation. The paper applied a critical theory paradigm and a documentary research strategy to identify policy-level documents on OER funding in the South African higher education sector. Content analysis was then applied to review what they said about OER funding. These outcomes were then measured against the National Policy Development Framework 2020, which also dominated the study's conceptual framework. The study's significant findings were that the OER funding policy did not meet the policymaking principles of the framework, and this exposed Higher Education to a poorly funded OER environment. The study recommended hastening the finalization of OER policy and the flexible application of current policy terms to include OER as a fundable higher education cause. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers facilitated a participatory action learning action research process with second year Social Sciences students at a University in the Eastern Cape of South Africa. This paper focusses on the facilitation of a participatory action learning action research process and the contribution of this to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning of the researchers. A social constructivist theoretical framework was employed. The significance of this research is that it adds to the understanding and implementation of participatory action learning action research, the evolving perception of participation as well as ownership within a participatory action learning action research process within the relatively less studied context of sub-Saharan African and South Africa more specifically. This paper demonstrates how utilising participatory action learning action research contributed to the researchers own "lifelong learning", particularly with regard to scholarship and collaborations in the process of knowledge production. The researchers' critical reflections and learning throughout this process could be of assistance to other researchers who are interested in embarking upon similar participatory research projects in higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the career of the prominent intellectual and activist Zachariah Keodirelang Matthews and his efforts to promote higher education for black South Africans during the mid-twentieth century. Popular narratives of South African history often tend to downplay or discredit the moderation, pragmatism and cultural diversity of Matthews and his generation and instead emphasize the growth of black solidarity and militancy, but study of Matthews’ writings reveals the important role of old liberal ideas in African nationalism, including an enduring faith in the power of knowledge and an expectation that justice would eventually prevail. The life and work of Z.K. Matthews demonstrates how an African teacher and scholar could steadfastly resist European domination while simultaneously maintaining belief in the essential oneness of humanity and hope for the future of South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID crisis has disrupted routine patterns and practices across all spheres of everyday life, rupturing social relations and destabilising our capacity for building coherent selves and communities by recollecting the past and imagining potential futures. Education is a key domain in which these hopes for the future have been dashed for many young people and in which commitments to critical scholarship and pedagogies are being contested. In a world of stark socioeconomic inequality, racism, and other forms of dehumanising othering, the pandemic serves not to disrupt narratives of meritocracy and progress but to expose them as the myths they have always been. This paper will explore forms of political resistance and the (im)possibilities for experimental pedagogies in response to the broken promises and unrealised dreams of (higher) education in the context of the COVID crisis. Reflecting on my own everyday life as a scholar and educator in a South African university, and in dialogue with students' narratives of experience, I will examine the ways in which the experience of the pandemic has released and mobilised new forms of resistance to historical institutional and pedagogical practices. However, these hopeful threads of alternative narratives are fragile, improvised in the weighty conditions of a status quo resistant to change, and in which the alienation and inequality of the terrain are being exacerbated and deepened through a proliferation of bureaucratic and technicist solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite adapting to the lockdown necessitated by the Coronavirus pandemic, Higher Education Institutions in South Africa have acknowledged that continued lockdown further jeopardizes the 2020 academic calendar. This paper looks at what the Higher Education response has been to continue with academic activity at the onset of Lockdown Level 5. The use of electronic tuition through various media channels has been highlighted since the announcement of lockdown, at all levels of education. While this approach may constitute work-in-progress, it also poses many challenges, chief of which is the high cost of Internet access and data. In this paper, an analytical literature review was conducted using communication media analysis through desktop research. Two conceptual structures, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and Two-way Communication Model (TCM), underpin the study. The paper found that the Coronavirus pandemic and lockdown have forced HEIs to rethink their teaching and learning strategy on the run; that online learning has begun but with varying degrees of success and that implementation presents challenges. Further monitoring post lockdown, to establish the effectiveness of the HEI response, is vital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is about how people experience places through the visuals that populate the place. I interviewed people who are part of Rhodes University in South Africa. It is the case that people experience places in a highly targeted manner and that from this manner they fashion ideas about the place. Experiencing universities through their visual culture is a phenomenon that is seldom studied. In South Africa, this reality of rare study was highlighted by the occurrence of the 2015 #RhodesMustFall moment when students across the country argued that there are visuals within the university space that remain experientially problematic within a postcolonial society. The South African higher education landscape was taken by surprise as it had not been adequately aware of the power that visuals can gain when considered as part of a culture of representation. Visual culture is in this paper defined as what is seen and allows itself to be placed within a culture of seeing and representation. As South Africa is a postcolonial society, it has been argued that the colonial period showed bias towards certain visual cultures throughout the country's spheres – especially in the country's tertiary education institutions. This is a paper documenting how students at a South African university experience the university through its visual culture. In‐depth mobile interviews, closely related to transect walks, were conducted with 12 "Rhodians" purposefully selected in the hope for maximum sample variation. The study finds that the experience of Rhodes University as a place through its visual culture is highly informed by the isolation of parts of the visual presentation of the built up and decorated environment, the expectation of what the visual culture should be, and the experience of alleged contestation over what is visually presented as the university. Ultimately, the university space is experienced often through its socially‐learned visual representations and the experiential templates that people bring to the place as seen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Apartheid left in its wake a South Africa characterized by social inequalities that are embedded and reflected in all spheres of social life, including the higher education system. While the post-apartheid government has made efforts to transform the higher education system it inherited, the pace has been slow and has fallen significantly short of what many regard as modest expectations. This paper interrogates why transformation has remained elusive in the higher education sector in post-apartheid South Africa, particularly with regards to the institutional culture at historically white universities (HWUs). Focusing on the Rhodes Must Fall (RMF) campaign at the University of Cape Town (UCT), and Luister, a documentary film at the University of Stellenbosch, it employs critical race theory (CRT) as a conceptual framework and analytical tool. Using CRT identifies the centrality of racism in shaping the slow pace of transformation in general and concerning the institutional culture at HWUs in particular. The paper concludes by reflecting on the implications of this lack of transformation, particularly in a time where poverty is endemic and unemployment rampant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COVID-19 has distorted the teaching and learning pedagogy, as well as the research process of higher education institutions, particularly in Africa. This pandemic-imposed restrictions on movement and demanded a shift to online interaction. This blurred the lines between work and home life and has exacerbated the deep chasms of inequality upon which South African society operates. Established on empirical evidence, substantiated by documentary data, this paper explores how these existing inequalities, exacerbated by COVID-19, manifest in the postgraduate research space of South African higher education institutions. Qualitative data were collected during a recorded focus group interview, and thematically analysed. Through a Neo-Weberian lens, it will illustrate that the pandemic, among other challenges, posed significant ethical challenges to honours students completing their research projects, in turn, shifting policies and requirements of higher education institutions (HEIs) themselves to ensure the protection of their students and quality of research output. These include concerns around digital exclusion, locating participant consent, as well as the collection of data via online channels (Zoom, WhatsApp, Skype) and their privacy parameters. Considering these gulfs of inequality, the paper recommends key requirements for the future of ethically sound research in higher education in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Covid-19 pandemic is intensifying existing problems of economic asymmetry, and other injustices, between and within countries and regions around the world. It is thus imperative that sociological studies of education document its socio-cultural implications in different locations and on different scales. It is equally imperative that such studies have a historical perspective that asks what pre-existing social problems have been intensified and how such intensification is happening. This paper responds to these imperatives through the deployment of conjunctural analysis and related crisis and articulation theory. We discuss the global Covid-19 conjuncture as it emerged in the first seven months of 2020 and show how it articulated with the preceding conjuncture. Subsequently, we focus on the issues associated with closing and reopening schools and show how they were intertwined with reconfigurations of the school/home/work nexus. We consider these reconfigurations in two very different locations, Australia and South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chapter 3 of the Constitution of South Africa makes provision for cooperative system of governance between the three tiers of government: national, provincial and local. In higher education this provision finds expression through the Higher Education Act 101 of 1997 and institutional statutes. Cooperative governance of public universities pivots around key institutional actors as part of democratisation of institutional governance. Cooperative governance is an important twentieth-century governance innovation for South African public universities. In juxtaposing university governance and public accountability, democratisation has been identified as a crucial ingredient in broadening the processes of decision making, promoting greater participation and ensuring inclusion of black "bodies" in university governance. One of the cooperative governance structures of South African public universities is the institutional forum (IF). Born in the crucible of student activism in the 1980s, IFs have had a mixture of success and failures since their first implementation in 1998. They were conceived as agents for social justice and democratisation in the driving of transformation of public universities. This paper examines extant literature on the evolution, functions and challenges of the IF in driving institutional transformation and concludes by suggesting further areas for research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that the South African postdoctoral fellow system is de-professionalising academic work by constituting postdocs as students who receive training from the university rather than employees who work for it. Ironically, it obscures this de-professionalisation with a discourse of postdoctoral fellowships as 'professional development' opportunities. This case is made through a critical discourse analysis which contrasts the way universities construct postdoctoral fellowships on their websites with a structural analysis of the functions postdoctoral fellows fulfil within a commodifying higher education system. Postdocs produce research outputs for universities more cheaply than employees, and in a way which makes universities score better on various metrics that only count permanently-employed academics. Considering Fairclough's ideas about the relationship between semiotic and other elements of institutions, the discourse of 'professional development' serves as a delaying and distracting tactic which keeps us from asking whether academic scholars should be supported by stable employment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research paper is a result of a comprehensive survey conducted in Further Education Training Colleges (FETC) providing educational services to South Africans residing in the various regions of Gauteng Province in South Africa. The main theme of the research was barriers that undermine service quality in teaching and learning in FETC institutions. The principal stakeholders of the study are educational leaders and administrators who sit on board councils in FETC institutions. Leadership quality in FETC institutions was measured and quantified by using a benchmark introduced by Northouse [2018. Leadership: Theory and Practice. Sage publications]. Ordered logit analysis was used for estimating and quantifying key predictors of service quality in teaching and learning as well as the efficient management of FETC institutions. Findings of the survey revealed that there is a need for elements of good institutional leadership. Examples of desirable attributes of leadership are honesty, personal integrity, accountability and transparency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How African migrants establish themselves within new contexts through struggles for education is a relatively under-researched phenomenon in South Africa. The notion of "idioms of rootlessness" has been developed to make sense of migrants' understandings of new hostile environments. This article troubles this botanical metaphor through an exploration of the life-history of one Zimbabwean woman who migrated to South Africa and the specific role of education in her trajectory in Zimbabwe and South Africa. Her story is examined against the backdrop of the changing political economy of education in Zimbabwe and South Africa. In highlighting how she navigates borders for the education of her children and decides which children to educate where it shows how educational values, beliefs and practices also migrate. The paper argues that her struggle for the education of her children can also be interpreted as an expression of the desire for attachment in both spaces and as a means of claiming a place in both countries, across borders, for herself and her children. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The principles of diversity and inclusion are valued across the higher education sector, but the ways in which these principles are translated into pedagogic practice are not always evident. Students who are first in their family to attend university continue to report barriers to full participation in university life. They are more likely to leave their studies early, and to achieve lower grades in their final qualifications, than students whose families have previous experience of higher education. The purpose of this study was to explore whether a mismatch between staff perceptions and students' experiences might be a possible contributor to these disparities. The study explored and compared staff discourses about the experiences of first generation students at two universities, one in the United Kingdom (UK), and the other in South Africa (SA). One-to-one interviews were carried out with 40 staff members (20 at each institution) to explore their views about first generation students. The results showed that staff were well aware of challenges faced by first generation students; however, they were unsure of their roles in relation to shaping an inclusive environment, and tended not to consider how to use the assets that they believed first generation students bring with them to higher education. This paper explores these staff discourses; and considers proposals for challenging commonly-voiced assumptions about students and university life in a broader context of diversity and inclusive teaching practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the announcement made by the South African government to decommercialise the Institution of Higher Learning (IHL), the fiscal crisis in higher education remains a stumbling block in the functionality of higher education. The fiscal crisis is caused by the Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) adopted at the national level, which advocate for government cutback in financing public sector. The crisis has led the IHL to adopt a market approach, which places the corporate segment in the IHL and treats education as a commodity that can be bought and sold. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to analyse the extent to which neoliberal policies contribute to the fiscal crisis in higher education. The neoliberal policies adopted at the national level challenges the conventional nature of higher education as a public good. Using extant literature, this paper argues that neoliberal policies are responsible for the funding crisis in higher education. It also argues that it is only when neoliberal policies are challenged at the national level, then, will the crisis disappear and if not, higher education will continue to be at the receiving end of these hostile policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to understand how students from low-income rural backgrounds in South Africa experience higher education and the opportunities and obstacles they encounter, the paper draws on two waves of interviews with 30 students currently studying at three large urban universities. Using concepts of capabilities and functionings, monetary resources and 'capitals', the paper outlines common factors which shape rural students' well-being and their agency in accessing an urban university. Student voices indicate the particular importance of being able to exercise the functioning of navigating and manoeuvring through unfamiliar and often intimidating institutions. The discussion also indicates that it is the intersection of rurality and low income which shapes, even if it does not over-determine, their lives at university. It is suggested that universities could do more to support these students' well-being, and to recognise the agency and admirable determination which students bring to the challenges they face. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents an introductory paper on Archives and Records Management offered by the Department of Library and Information Sciences of the University of Transkei in Unitra, South Africa. Rationale; Skills gained after the training based on the paper; Course contents; Teaching method employed; Weaknesses of the paper.

In this short commentary, I explore some recent shifts in the landscape of South African higher education, from the vantage point of my particular location within Geography at the University of Cape Town. Although those of us working in this context have experienced multiple challenges in recent years, I argue here that we could usefully re‐frame the ongoing state of crisis as a moment of opportunity in which we might both revitalise critical geographical work and engender more just cultures of academic praxis, premised on relationships of care. In particular, Geography could productively engage more directly, in both its theory and its praxis, with Southern and decolonial scholarship as well as postcolonial and feminist thought. Such a move would deepen our understanding of where we are, how we got here, and how we might build more equitable relationships. It would help us to see the world more clearly and imagine alternatives more effectively, from our diverse locations on the African continent. This commentary explores recent shifts in the landscape of South African higher education, from the vantage point of one academic's situated and embodied perspective. The paper argues that we could usefully re‐frame the ongoing state of crisis as a moment of opportunity in which we might both revitalise critical geographical work and engender more just cultures of academic praxis, premised on relationships of care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study aims to investigate a framework for improving library services and resource usage in a private higher education institution in South Africa. Marketing of library services and resources has a great impact on their usage. If marketing is not properly applied, libraries can turn into the unused institution, render useless or unused services, no matter how good their available services and resources are. Design/methodology/approach: This multi-method study used questionnaires to collect data from both staff and students at the private higher education institution concerned. The questionnaire was augmented with data collected from staff using group interviews. It is unfortunate that the target institution approved the conducting of the study only on the condition that their name could not be disclosed or used in any study reports. On this basis, the institution is referred to as Campus A for the purposes of this paper. Findings: The study discovered that Campus A lacked key marketing tools, such as a marketing policy for the library, and that it also failed to take advantage of new platforms such as social media and other available computer software and technologies. This has resulted in its users being unaware of certain important services and resources rendered by the library. Originality/value: The study proposed a framework for library marketing practices to improve services and resources usage as a benchmark for libraries. The study also recommends that the management of Campus A library come together to gather information for the development of an appropriate library marketing policy and also ensure that their marketing strategies take advantage of the latest technology, including social media, by means of which their clients may be easily reached. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pandemic has compelled Higher Education Institutions around the world to resort to Emergency Remote Learning (ERL). This abrupt 'pivot to online' learning has exacerbated existing challenges in Higher Education, particularly in South Africa. This paper interrogates whether the sudden move to ERL has compounded or ameliorated existing academic challenges for students in Higher Education Institutions. The study summarised herein draws on 'critical humanising pedagogy', an approach that centres student needs in the teaching and learning process. In exploring student experiences and perceptions of ERL, the study adopted a qualitative approach, with specific focus on students from one of SA's top five universities. A perturbing finding is that teaching and learning under ERL has regressed into impersonal methodologies, devoid of any notion of pedagogy as the science and art of teaching. More unsettling is that ERL has alienated and disengaged students from learning as a collaborative process. The increased transactional distance between students and academics has desensitised the latter to the peculiar challenges students encounter in the virtual classroom. The study recommends Higher Education should consider student difficulties in adapting to online remote learning and find ways of fostering student-centred pedagogy in virtual classrooms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The primary objective of the research was to investigate the mailing practices and filing methods in a computer support or administrative environment involving the resulting abuse of paper. In applied research, an exploratory investigation focused on selected higher education institutions in Gauteng with a structured questionnaire as measuring instrument. In the analysis and interpretations of the findings, correlation and cross-tabulation on all sets of variables determined whether any meaningful associations could be found. The investigation indicated that the war against paper abuse is not over by any means. Perceptions regarding a paperless office and assumptions that technology could assist organisations to combat paper abuse were unfounded, mainly because of a lack of guidance, training interventions and control measures. Consequently, follow-up research is presently conducted whereby models will be designed and implemented concomitant with specified computer software features in order to counteract the abuse of paper and facilitate the effective use of information and communication technology interfaced work processes and procedures. This article focuses only on the electronic mail and filing components of the investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The role of higher education in development and social mobility is now widely acknowledged and globally recognised. In South Africa in particular, graduates have greatly increased employment prospects. This paper takes up the importance of addressing South African university students' multi-dimensional well-being in the light of global higher education development agendas. Considering poverty and development in the space of higher education – specifically in the lives of youth from low-income households in South Africa – I draw on two waves of life history data from undergraduate students at five universities. Material-cultural conditions for a threshold of well-being emerged powerfully in every single student narrative, indicating a need for some rethinking of capability deprivation and poverty. This paper conceptualises three broad hardship categories specific to higher education, considering the multiplicity of factors and complexity of low-income in student experiences and achievements. Even though the theoretical framing draws on Sen's capability approach and its attractive moral perspective, the paper also foregrounds students' material well-being as significant in understanding how education can advance change, and not only reproduce social inequalities. The challenge remains, how do we reconcile resources and capabilities, and to link freedoms to financial analysis in evaluating the lives that students value? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is based on a study conducted to establish if academic practice in a university designated as Azania is aligning or diverting from the expectations of the rising knowledge society in South Africa. The paper is motivated by the emerging national needs specific to the production, dissemination and application of knowledge as the country takes steps towards knowledge led development. The general assumption is that academic practice in universities is spontaneously responding to the needs of its changing environment. Thus, to establish the position of academic practice in Azania, institutional and national documents were examined from a neo-institutional perspective through qualitative discourse analysis. The results showed that research, teaching and outreach at the University was responding to national needs. Thus, academic practice in Azania is aligning more than diverting from the expectations of the rising knowledge society. However, considering that the study based on only document analysis a focus on other data sources is recommended. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the paper concerning higher education in South Africa. It notes that the paper has placed its emphasis on vocational training but has given little much importance to have a coherent plan to implement the necessary changes in the system. It mentions that the country is facing 3 million 18-24 years old who are neither have tertiary education nor labour market preference.

In South Africa, inequalities endemic to HE systems worldwide are further compounded by apartheid legacies. Despite an intensive focus for over twenty years on how pedagogic intervention could be harnessed to address these inequalities, black students' participation and success rates in South African HE remain stubbornly low, suggesting a need for fresh perspectives. This paper draws on a study conducted in a South African vocational university to illuminate the complex nature of lecturers' writing pedagogies. It does this by placing lecturers at the centre of detailed qualitative enquiry, a relatively rare focus in student writing research. We show how lecturers understand student writing development and how their pedagogies are informed by language ideologies operating within and beyond the university. Findings suggest the need to engage with the complex lived experiences of lecturers in order to promote deeper pedagogical change, both in South Africa and the HE sector more widely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The perceived dichotomy between public or private benefits to higher education remains of growing interest in higher education research and policy. In this paper, I borrow from the African philosophy of Ubuntu as a conceptual lens to interrogate this binary within the South African context using the 'black tax' phenomenon. Gleaning secondary evidence from online sources, I posit that while black tax is being misused and abused by some beneficiaries, the experiences of majority of black professional graduates within their nuclear and extended families suggest a public good value of higher education beyond the suggested private benefit of earnings and social mobility. I argue using core components of 'Ubuntu' that understanding the benefits of higher education in a context such as South Africa demands a nuance approach beyond the current dichotomy. I conclude that black tax blurs the lines and serves a public good function within a private good. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study engages with various challenges in contemporary higher education in South Africa. Firmly rooted in contextual challenges, this paper draws on a pedagogy of vulnerability to propose that engaging critically with vulnerability enables a decolonial disposition to epistemology and ontology. The study explores how a community of PGDip students and teacher embraced shifts by being authentic, inclusive, open and honest in their pedagogical interactions, to re-cast themselves as teachers who are human(e). Using a reflective narrative methodology to interpret their experiences, the authors assert that academics are unlikely to meet the challenges before them if they have not experienced some of the vulnerability their students experience. The aim is to also show links with how students perceive us, given their own vulnerabilities. We assert that vulnerability can be used as a productive tool and decolonial catalyst to invigorate teaching and learning engagements in local and global university contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the core of using languages other than English in higher education in South Africa lies the processes of translation/mediation and the mediators themselves. Within the framework of the descriptive theory of translation, this paper offers a critical consideration of the people and processes at the heart of one such project at the University of the Western Cape, South Africa: the mediators who must either translate lecture material or lend their voices to the aural versions of such materials. The paper shows the processes involved in translating part of a lecture in English into varieties of Afrikaans and isiXhosa, and making these available in both reading and listening format. In addition, the paper examines interview responses of five of the mediators involved in the project, as well as some student responses to the material. Apart from showing the interdependence between the different stages of mediation in this project, we concluded that discipline-specific mediation is best done by subject specialists themselves. The findings also showed that most students felt that the informal, localised translations in the oral format offered the greatest epistemological access to the course content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the state's response to students' claim for free education that has rocked South African tertiary institutions since 2015. These responses have been characterised by the enforcement of a de facto state of emergency materialised by an extreme securitisation/militarisation of campuses and other public spaces, resulting in human/student rights and the rule of law being brought to a standstill. The paper further discusses the background to the #FeesMustFall protest and attempts to understand why the crisis was addressed only more than two years after it erupted. The article proceeds by looking into the aftermath of the fees must fall campaign characterised by an escalation of security mechanisms which succeeded in turning the campuses into camps where fact and law are merged into one another and where a state of emergency has lost its exceptional character and became the new normal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After nearly 25 years of democracy, lives of young South Africans are still profoundly shaped by the legacies of apartheid. This paper considers how these differences are produced, maintained and disrupted through an exploration of changing narratives developed by a small group of South African pre-service teachers, with a particular focus on the narratives developed around discourses of fatherhood generally and absent fathers in particular. We draw on interviews conducted with three students in which we discussed their digital stories and literature reviews. In this paper, we draw attention to the limitations of digital storytelling and the risks such autobiographical storytelling presents of perpetuating dominant narratives that maintain and reproduce historical inequalities. At the same time, in highlighting ways in which this risk might be confronted, the paper also aims to show the possibilities in which these dominant narratives may be challenged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher Education in South Africa has been in crisis over recent years. University systems in many parts of South Africa have witnessed student protest, as well as ongoing violence, resulting in many campuses turning into spaces of violent confrontation between students and police. This paper examines student social activism in the higher education sector in South Africa, especially the Nelson Mandela University, as well as the patterns that exist and frame student social activism in pursuit of 'black power.' Furthermore, the paper notes the strong sense of solidarity and unity amongst students, despite these existent challenges. The paper will also present a historical analysis of student activism in South Africa with the aim of demonstrating the longstanding and persistent student politics as well as the student dissatisfaction with, the way in which the higher education has been governed in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we critically reflect on our conceptualization and operationalization of "rapid photovoice" as a close-up, emancipatory, action research methodology which has multiple, intersecting social-justice goals; and consider the methodology's potential for helping to achieve such goals. We first consider photovoice in relation to its typical use in public health research, as well as in prior research into student experiences of higher education. We then consider our pragmatic redesign of the methodology as rapid photovoice (RPV), which we conceptualized in response to the goals, parameters, and constraints inherent in our project, which studied student movement violence and wellbeing. In the third part of the article, we describe and discuss our operationalization of RPV in this study on four university campuses in South Africa. In the fourth section, we reflect on some of the ethical considerations arising from the topic and the methodology. In the final section of the article, we critically assess the interim outcomes of our use of RPV in terms of (1) psychologically empowering students to reflect on traumatic experiences in a safe space and enhancing their self-awareness of wellbeing, wellbeing resources and coping strategies; (2) the politically emancipatory potential of photovoice to represent student experiences authentically and with immediacy to higher education policy role-players, and (3) its ability to co-create artifacts of collective memory that provide authentic empirical material for making trustworthy knowledge claims. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is a personal reflection that seeks to capture most of the observable changes that have taken place in South Africa and in its public university system as a consequence of the sudden and global spread of the novel coronavirus. The purpose for doing so is to provide a record of how the South African university sector has responded to the covid-19 pandemic, based on the assumption that there have been a variety of national and sectoral responses to the unprecedented crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]