The Disability Unit, headed by Dr Nina Du Toit, is working in partnership with Business for Good, a non-profit training consultancy, to bring the first-of-its-kind short course aimed at addressing issues relating to the disabled.

The course, which was piloted in July, primarily looks at training human resource practitioners in the practices around recruiting and retaining people with disabilities.

Although the course is not restricted to recruiters, it has a strong focus on training and development, with six full-time participants ranging from private Corporates to other non-profit organisations and government departments; from recruitment officer to middle managers.

Thus far, the pilot is run over 13 weeks, with classes taking place on Thursday evenings for three hours with participants needing to complete 30 hours and submit a substantial portfolio of evidence in order to receive a CPUT-endorsed course certificate.

The course administration is done through the Centre for Continuing Education (CCE), headed by Mike Du Plessis and currently holds a National Qualifications Framework (NQF) 5 rating with the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA).

Course co-ordinator and Business for Good’sHuman Resource Director, BeatriceKoopman,says that the course is accessible to anyone who has an interest in issues of people with disabilities.

“For the pilot course offering, we identified participants in industry and government who we felt could benefit from the information we gathered and hope to develop confident ‘job coaches’ who can assist people with disabilities in finding suitable, fulfilling employment”, says Koopman.

“We offer knowledge and information to the potential or current employer about reasonable accommodation and legislation adherence, and some key benefits include creating sustainability, diversity and tolerance for the disabled members of our society to find their place in industry or public service”.

According to Dr Du Toit, who is also a moderator and one of the four course lecturers, potential students need to have either a grade 12 certificate or have grade 10 with at least five years experience in disability work placements. The course, although offered primarily in English, can be translated into Afrikaans, where needed.

She says: “So far the programme been well-received and we hope to run it again next year in February, so anyone who’s interested can contact the Disability Unit (via the CPUT website) for more information”.

By: Thando J. Moiloa

Written by CPUT News
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To address the critical shortage of qualified medical laboratory scientists in South Africa, CPUT's Biomedical Sciences Department has become the first in the country to offer a professional degree in Medical Laboratory Science.

The degree was approved by the Department of Higher Education and Training (DoHET), the Higher Education Quality Committee (HEQC), the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA) and the Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA) to be offered as from January 2011.

CPUT will replace its three-year National Diploma: Biomedical Technology with the professional degree. According to Prof Johan Esterhuyse, Head of Department Biomedical Sciences, the degree has been structured so that it contains elements of both the National Diploma as well as BTech: Biomedical Technology.   Esterhuyse, who is also the national coordinator of the re-curriculation process says, "Offering such a degree will create better recognition of the qualification and also give us an opportunity to train highly qualified scientists. This degree will also open doors for our students and create more job opportunities as the qualification will give them better access to a greater job market globally." The professional degree will lead to further advanced levels of study towards Master's and Doctoral degrees.The department has also completed a new curriculum which has been approved nationally.  According to Esterhuyse, the new curriculum includes more integrated Pathophysiology and Molecular Biology, which is currently the new way of thinking in Biomedical Science.To keep everyone in the loop, the department has organised workshops to ensure that staff members know what is expected of them. "We would not have done this without the support we got from management and many other role players", added Esterhuyse.By:  Andiswa Dantile

Written by CPUT News
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CPUT has registered a range of academic programmes pertaining to the training of paralegal practitioners with the South African Qualifications Authority.

The programmes to be offered will range from a General Certificate up to a Doctoral qualification.

Last week, the Unit for Applied Law hosted the first-ever regional colloquium at the Cape Town Hotel School under the theme: “The transformation of the legal profession: A paralegal perspective”.

Delivering the keynote address, Ashraf Mohamed of the Cape Law Society said paralegal practitioners can be the backbone of the justice system and that legal training should be about social justice.

He says paralegal training at universities should include the taking of statements and provision of free legal advice to members of the community.

Seth Mnguni, Chairperson of the Association of Community Advice Officers of South Africa, say community-based paralegal practitioners use sets of facts to give their communities access to effective justice without litigation.

Mnguni says paralegal practitioners are trained to deal with prevalent problems in their communities in an unintimidating manner as they spoke the local languages.

The delegates discussed the role of paralegal practitioners as outlined in Chapter 4 of the Draft Legal Practice Bill of 2009.

Written by Kwanele Butana
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