Inspired by its resolve to become a great university, CPUT will hold its first ever University Assembly later this month to address the challenges facing the South African society as well as how the university aims to deal with them.

The event is an initiative by CPUT’s Council to encourage free speech within the university and entrench a culture of dialogue, says Transformation and Cohesion manager George Mvalo.

The keynote address will be delivered by Professor Barney Pityana, former Vice-chancellor at the University of South Africa, and will be followed by a panel discussion involving student leadership and the university’s management.

Four cross-cutting themes will be discussed during the assembly:

Creating a distinct university identity

The assembly will discuss questions such as:

• What should be CPUT’s distinct academic identity?
• What should set CPUT apart from other institutions in its quest to be a great University in Africa?
• What kind of mutually beneficial partnerships should CPUT forge in line with its mission and vision?

Students at the center of service delivery

This commitment presupposes that students should be afforded an opportunity to enjoy a well- rounded and enriching student experience within and outside the classroom.

Efficiency and effectiveness

Dwindling resources mean that universities need to use the resources at their disposal in a more efficient and effective way. Efficiency and effectiveness is a sine qua non of sustainability and forms part of the themes propounded in CPUT’s strategic vision 2020.

Applied research and innovation

CPUT’s 10 year Research and Technology Innovation (RTI) blueprint foregrounds applied research and innovation as critical elements of developing a distinct university.

For more information about the University Assembly contact Mr George Mvalo on +27 21 460 3797.

Staff and students who would like to attend the event can RSVP online.

Written by Kwanele Butana

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In its quest to promote the transformation agenda in this institution, the Office of the Vice-Chancellor has appointed George Mvalo in the new position of Manager for Institutional Transformation, Social Cohesion and Diversity at CPUT.

The position entails aligning the departmental and faculty employment equity targets to the institutional employment equity plan.

This therefore means he has to ensure that Council’s set targets of 30% overall African representivity, 52% overall female, 2.1% Indian, 24.4% White, 42.8% Coloured and 2% of employees with disabilities are met by 2012.

Mvalo was previously attached to the Research Office as a Market Liaison Officer.

He was charged with promoting maths and science in public disadvantaged schools using interactive science and technology exhibits, facilitating whole school enrichment programmes and coordinating all institutional community partnership projects.

In announcing Mvalo’s appointment, Dr Nomathamsanqa Tisani, Adviser to the Vice-Chancellor, said: “At this time in the life of the Institution it has been deemed necessary to have an office that will co-ordinate all Transformation initiatives and activities in order to promote coherence and synergy on this weighty matter.

Mvalo will thus touch all aspects of University life in a bid to deepen the transformation process and promote the development of “an empowering environment at CPUT”.

Mvalo said his challenge will be “the mainstreaming of the transformation agenda in all spheres of University life, from the time a poor yet deserving first generation student applies for study, to a welcoming, supporting teaching and learning classroom climate to the procurement of goods and services from BBBEE suppliers”.

He said it is important to “fundamentally change the profile of knowledge producers and mediators of the knowledge enterprise, in other words realising the institutional mission and vision and living our values thus creating an empowering environment for both students and staff”.

Among his key focus areas will be to develop an institutional transformation strategy and operational plan, raising awareness about equity and diversity, monitoring and evaluation of transformation, social cohesion and diversity initiatives and the cultivation of external linkages by creating a public platform for dialogue.

He said this project will leave a legacy for many years to come if properly executed and enjoying institutional support and buy in.

Mvalo said he was very excited about his new role as it has the potential to “catapult our young institution into a force to be reckoned with within the public higher education sector”.

By Thami Nkwanyane

Written by CPUT News
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CPUT recently launched its Transformation Charter, making it one of the few institutions of higher learning that have reached that stage in the transformation agenda.

The launch was very symbolic in that it took place two days after Human Rights Day, 21 March, 50 years after the commemoration of Sharpeville Day (Human Rights Day), and 25 years after the Langa Massacre.

The launch is also significant as CPUT will host the Department of Higher Education and Training’s first-ever national stakeholder summit on higher education transformation from 22 to 23 April 2010.

George Mvalo, Manager for Institutional Transformation, Social Cohesion and Diversity at CPUT, said the higher education landscape in our country is such that universities need to respond in a coherent manner to the various transformation imperatives that are facing us.

He said the new document will bind us all and that it addresses seven principles of transformation. The process has so far involved two stages, with the first stage concentrating on the distribution of the charter itself on the cover of the current year’s desktop calendars. This was then followed by the launch.

Mvalo said the next step was to embed the charter in all processes. “We need to incorporate it amongst other things within our employment equity transformation processes and the transformation strategy. It should also be part of our strategic planning and we need to ensure that it cascades down to all levels within our university. We need to keep the charter alive and also see how can we carve out a student charter and enhance students’ lives,” he said.

Dr Sabie Surtee, the guest speaker for the day, painted a bleak picture of employment equity in the workplace according to the findings of a research she undertook at selected Western Cape organisations.

Her presentation, entitled “Transformation: African People in the Western Cape,” reached the following findings: “There was a low level of appointments of Africans in middle and junior management level posts. This was accompanied by robust appointment rates of white people in this occupational level which in most cases was double if not more than their numerical representivity in the South African population as a whole”.

It was recommended among other things that “The participating companies should build inter-company collaborative networks. This would allow them to identify and develop good practice to improve EE progress. Wider stakeholder engagement is needed to deal constructively with the social factors that make the Western Cape an unattractive destination for African professionals.

Participating companies need to review the format they are currently using to conduct staff meetings to address the “invisible syndrome”. A new methodology needs to be implemented where the voices of all staff are recognised, heard and respected”.

“Business was concerned about the difficulty that its members in the Western Cape were having in attracting and retaining African professionals on certain levels. Independent research was hence needed to understand what are the barriers to the achievement of employment equity in relation to African people in the Western Cape,” she said.

By Thami Nkwanyane

Written by CPUT News
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Insights into bridging the gender gap between men and women were discussed at a recent Gender Transformation Symposium held at the Granger Bay Campus.

George Mvalo, Chairperson: Universities South Africa (USAf) Transformation Managers Forum, said his forum’s priorities include bringing about Gender equality and putting an end to Gender-Based violence.

Mvalo observed that most universities were run by men and that all universities under administration were also run by men.

"We risk becoming a failed generation due to persistent structural imbalances at our universities,” he argued.

He added that the gender agenda was at the centre of transformation and called for an end to gender discrimination and marginalisation.

Prof Vivienne Taylor, a retired UK academic and Commissioner: National Planning Commission (NPC), said the brutality of violence perpetrated against women, gender pay gap and poverty were some of the challenges women have to deal with.

“Men who are supposed to protect women are the assailants,” added Taylor.

She argued that the significance of women's emancipation starts with re-organising the significance of women's roles as women cannot always wait for the government to protect their rights.

“The NPC is currently assessing progress in the implementation of the NDP, which was launched in 2012,” she revealed. “A rigorous review of the NDP is necessary.”

“We would welcome research on women's abuse by universities as a start towards women empowerment,” she said.

Yaa Ashantewa Archer- Ngidi, Social Cohesion Advocate at the Durban University of Technology, said rewriting history by correcting the lies told by previous authors is one of the mandates of the advocates.

Archer-Ngidi added that women should not accept being humiliated because that is a sign of an inferior complex.

Tamara Mathebula, Chairperson: Commission for Gender Equality, discussed the importance of gender transformation in higher education during the CPUT Gender Transformation Symposium.

Dr Nyx Mclean, a lecturer in the Faculty of Informatics and Design at CPUT, suggested actions that can be implemented to protect gender diversity among students and staff including the following:

Include a "transgender" or "other and specify" options on forms;

Include preferred name and option to change gender identity on university software systems;

Ruling out binary coded language such as "ladies and gentlemen" even on emails and;

Building gender-neutral bathrooms in addition to the ladies and gentlemen’s ones.

Written by Kwanele Butana

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The midyear holidays saw the Cape Town Campus of the Cape Peninsula University of Technology open its doors to 440 dedicated school learners for the annual Association for Educational Transformation (ASSET) Winter School programme.

ASSET is an NGO which provides educational opportunities to scholars from disadvantaged communities in the Western Cape.

The Winter School, which is aimed at offering extra tuition to Grade 11 and 12 learners from fourteen different development schools in the Western Cape focuses on providing extra tuition and preparing learners for the final Matric examinations. Subjects that are offered include Mathematics, Physical Science, Economics, Accounting and Life Skills. According to George Mvalo, Marketing Liaison Officer at the Research and Development department at CPUT, the course has a strong focus on goal setting and conflict resolution.

“One week of school holidays allows children to be productively engaged in worthwhile activity whilst exposing learners to a tertiary institution, which acts as an incentive for further study,” said Mvalo. He added, “The winter School is a highlight in the lives of many of these children and provides an opportunity for them to dream about their future.”

A comment made by one of the learners who attended the school certainly backed up Mvalo’s statement about the school being a “highlight”. “I liked meeting new people and making friends. The teachers were friendly and the accommodation was incredible. I hated the going home time.”

CPUT has been actively involved with ASSET and the Winter School programme for over a decade providing a service to learners in the developing Western Cape region contributing to their growth and development.

By Tyrone Van Heerden, Marketing and Communication Department

Written by CPUT News
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