UNIVERSITY of Cape Town (UCT) Vice-Chancellor Professor Mamokgethi Phakeng has been elected as International Alliance of Research Universities (IARU) chairperson, marking the first time in the organisation’s history that it has been led by an African.

IARU, which was established in 2006, is a network of 11 international research-intensive universities from Australia, Switzerland, Singapore, China, the US, the UK, Denmark, Japan and South Africa.

The network is comprised of Australian National University, Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zurich, National University of Singapore, Peking University, University of California – Berkeley, University of Cambridge, UCT, University of Copenhagen, University of Oxford, University of Tokyo and Yale University.

The purpose of IARU is to promote institutional joint working on various levels of the member universities, such as inter-university networking, institutional learning and staff development.

Its projects cover a range of topics, including equal opportunities, technology transfer, technology-enhanced learning, research administration, libraries and open access.

Phakeng was elected at the recent IARU Presidents’ meeting, which took place at Cambridge University in the UK. She will succeed University of Cambridge Vice-Chancellor Professor Stephen J Toope as IARU chair at the end of this year.

“Our world is facing extraordinary challenges, and universities have a key role to play in sustaining and strengthening the global connections necessary to meet the moment. Since joining in 2016, UCT has made a significant contribution to all aspects of the alliance,” Toope said on June 20.

Phakeng will serve a two-year term from 2023 to 2025, during which the IARU secretariat will be located at UCT.
“Higher education has a critical role to play in this time of global inequality, rising nationalism and the planetary threat of climate change. UCT values deeply the close relationships within the alliance that generate the trust and insights to play a part in tackling these challenges together,” she said.

IARU has a global reach across a relatively small membership, which allows unprecedented peer-to-peer networking and sharing.
Its activities range widely from working groups focused on vital aspects of running a leading research university – including equal opportunities, cybersecurity, libraries and open access – to tackling global challenges such as sustainable solutions to climate change.

The alliance also offers opportunities for students to attend joint courses and internships.

The 11 IARU members share similar values, a global vision and a commitment to educating future world leaders. Central to these values is the importance of academic diversity and international collaboration.

ENGINEERING NEWS

MATEBOHO GREEN|

UNIVERSITIES South Africa’s Research and Innovation Strategy Group has endorsed a list of actions and initiatives to focus on in 2022 and beyond, stemming from the recommendations of the 2nd Higher Education Conference of October 2021. At their second meeting for the year on 9 June, members of the Group elected a four-member task team to dissect this list of actions and draw a workable implementation programme.

In the action plan, the most dominant theme is collaboration amongst universities. Recognising the benefit, for institutions and society, of working together to advance research and strengthen innovation, the RISG will advocate greater collaboration between universities nationally, in the region and globally and encourage student and staff mobility across systems for the cross-pollination of ideas and collective resolution of global challenges.

In the context of CoVID-19, the RISG, chaired by Professor Thoko Mayekiso (left), who is also the Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Mpumalanga, will investigate in detail, the pandemic’s impact on research practices within institutions.

This will include identifying best practices and innovations inspired by the pandemic and exploring viable mechanisms to replicate those practices across the system. The issue of research funding also received much attention during the Higher Education Conference. In collaboration with USAf’s Funding Strategy Group, the RISG will explore alternative funding mechanisms available to universities, acknowledging South Africa’s low research funding base, including the funding crisis faced by the National Research Foundation (NRF).

At the Higher Education Conference, delegates acknowledged that research is of little use if its findings and value are not shared publicly for societal understanding. The RISG will examine multiple ways to make research findings more accessible to the public. The Group will also dedicate efforts to entrench the principle of the Engaged University by championing engaged science and scholarship, which requires more meaningful collaboration with society in research during all research processes, such as design, resourcing, implementation and, ultimately, in information sharing on findings and facilitation of mutual appreciation for research benefits.

Alongside championing engaged research, the RISG will invest more effort in promoting research quality across the system. To that end, the Group will review current research incentives to shift their emphasis from research quantity to quality, and ensure a shared appreciation of the changing focus across the system.

Finally, in its Plan of action to embed societal impact in universities’ research endeavours, the RISG will work closely with the NRF to disseminate information and facilitate understanding across the system, of the research impact criteria developed by the NRF. In 2021, the NRF decided to assess new research proposals for their potential societaland knowledge impact as part of the criteria informing research funding decisions.

According to the NRF, impact in those two respects is described as “beneficial change in society or knowledge advancement, brought about as a direct or indirect result of the NRF’s research support interventions, whether planned or unintended, immediate or long-term.”

Stakeholder updates from the sector

The 9 June meeting of the RISG also saw members receiving updates from other stakeholders, on matters of common interest in the higher education sector. From the Department of Science and Innovation (DSI), Mr Bheki Hadebe, Director: High-End Skills, informed the Group that the Department would be winding up stakeholder consultations on the Science, Technology and Innovation (STI) Decadal Plan during the coming months of July, and August. Following the consultations, the Plan would be tabled to the management committee of the Forum of South Africa’s Directors-General (FOSAD) before being presented to Cabinet for final approval. The second convening of the Inter-Ministerial Council (IMC) is planned for November.

Mr Bheki Hadebe also mentioned that the Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation had approved the public release of the National PhD Tracer study report. The study traced the mobility, career paths and other attributes of about 16 000 PhD graduates who graduated from South African universities between 2002 and 2018. The study was commissioned by the DSI, project-managed by the Water Research Commission and conducted by the DSI-NRF Centre of Excellence in Scientometrics and Science, Technology and Innovation Policy (ScISTIP) at Stellenbosch University. Mr Hadebe said the DSI was finalising the branding of the report for public release and however committed to making the un-branded report available to RISG members with a caution that they make the necessary acknowledgements in its usage (DSI study, project managed by the WRC and conducted by SciSTIP/CREST).

From the University of the Witwatersrand (WITS), Professor Nithaya Chetty, Dean of Science at the institution, shared information on Wits’ new initiative seeking to nurture entrepreneurial thinking to create more innovative graduates, especially at the doctoral level — while maintaining the highest levels of academic scholarship and critical thinking (more on this in a separate report.)

In addition to the updates above, the RISG members also heard from the Chief Executive Officer of the South African National Library and Information Consortium (SANLiC), Mr Glenn Truran, on the progress made to date in steering South Africa towards Open Access to global academic journals.

From the Southern African Research and Innovation Management Association (SARIMA), the President, Professor Andrew Bailey, explained measures being undertaken by his organisation to professionalise portfolios in research administration for better career pathing in distinct research management areas.

USAf also presented its own updates as Ms Janet van Rhyn, USAf’s Project Manager for Operations and Sector Support, briefed the RISG members on the 5th South Africa-Japanese Universities (SAJU) Forum conference coming up from 28-29 July, that will be hosted as an online event with Japanese counterparts. Dr Linda Meyer, USAf’s Director: Operations and Sector Support, in turn, appraised the members of the R1billion fundraising milestone that is on track to be reached in September 2022 towards student bursaries and historical debt.

Professor Thoko Mayekiso, Chairperson of RISG, expressed her appreciation at all the presentations and congratulated Dr Meyer for her on-going fundraising efforts. The meeting on 9 June was the second of three annual meetings of the RISG. The last meeting for the year will be held in October and will be a joint meeting with the Deputy Vice-Chancellors: Research.

USAF

SINCE the launch of the Cement & Concrete South Africa (CCSA) last year, the organisation has hosted a range of educational and concrete research and development initiatives to promote research, and improve skills and education, in the cement and concrete industry.

The first of these CCSA initiatives is the Young Concrete Researchers and Engineers Technologists Symposium (YCRETS) that promotes research in the local industry.

The YCRETS initiative was initially planned to begin in 2020, but was delayed to early 2021, owing to the Covid-19 pandemic.

YCRETS showcased 24 technical presentations from young concrete researchers, engineers and technologists on July 13 and 14 last year.

“This was a virtual event during which young students and researchers 35 years and under would have an opportunity to interact with academics and discuss their research work. “The presentations were of an excellent standard, and we’re hoping to do another event later this year,” says CCSA business development manager Hanlie Turner.

The initiative also involved academic staff from the University of the Witwatersrand, in Gauteng, forming a scientific committee that analysed and peer reviewed presentations that were submitted.

Turner states that CCSA is also creating a scientific committee in conjunction with the Stellenbosch University to have a YCRETS hybrid event in Stellenbosch, in the Western Cape.

“YCRETS has provided great exposure for young students and researchers. The presentations were published in the online proceedings as well as in our quarterly magazine.”

She adds that YCRETS helps to introduce young students to the industry and enables contractors and cement and concrete companies to identify potential candidates for employment.

YCRETS is also not limited to students at academic institutions, as young technologists from private companies can contribute their own research.

Another CCSA educational initiative is the 19 CONCRETEFiX webinars that have been hosted to date, covering a range of topics.

Turner states that the webinar series was initiated in 2020 – before CCSA was consolidated from multiple industry bodies – particularly amid the onset of Covid-19 and demand for online educational opportunities.

“This year, we’ve planned to do a webinar once a month. The tenth edition of Fulton’s Concrete Technology handbook was published last year, and we are getting the authors of some of the chapters in the handbook to present during these webinars. “This will enable the authors to elaborate and provide more background information on their chapters,” she explains.

Holding these webinars provides an opportunity for people who are not able to attend physical classes to become educated on cement- and concrete-related topics.

She also highlights the 2022 Fulton Awards, held earlier this month, which had 24 submissions this year.

The awards are held every two years for excellence in concrete design and construction, and the winners are chosen as entire teams responsible for producing a submitted constructed structure or development.

The categories include buildings of up to R50-million in value, buildings worth more than R50-million, infrastructure of up to R100-million and infrastructure of more than R100-million, as well as innovation and invention in concrete.

“This isn’t just a judgment based on a written submission – the judges, comprising a materialist specialist, structural engineer and professional architect, would visit and assess projects on site.”

She highlights another benefit to this year’s awards being that CCSA became an international partner of industry body the American Concrete Institute, which also has an awards scheme. The winners of CCSA’s five categories will be entered into the American Concrete Institute Awards.

Further, the CCSA KwaZulu-Natal branch introduced the Careers in Concrete initiative last year to promote diverse career opportunities in the cement and concrete industry.

Owing to the successes of this initiative, Turner says the branch is looking to expand this initiative to other education institutions in the province.

While the initiative was done in partnership with the University of KwaZulu-Natal, the KwaZulu-Natal branch is engaging with the Durban University of Technology on the possibility of partnering with the institution on this initiative.

The CCSA is also examining the possibility of running this initiative with academic institutions in the Western Cape, and Gauteng CCSA branches in the future.

“The challenges of the past year were formidable, but presented opportunities, and opportunities culminated in development. This is exactly what CCSA stands for: a unified body to lead the local industry towards relevance and growth. We are confident that CCSA will grow even further in its second year of establishment,” she concludes.

Engineering News

MORE than 10,000 school leavers who are predicted three Bs in their A-levels this summer have not got a firm offer at any university, as competition for places at top institutions places increases.

Experts say that in recent years school leavers were entering a “buyer’s market” in university places, with applicants standing a good chance of talking their way into a good university even if they missed a grade. But this year, with elite universities fearful of over-recruiting after being forced to take more students than they wanted during the pandemic, and a demographic surge in the number of 18-year-olds, competition has been fierce.

Andrew Hargreaves, founder of Data HE, a consultancy that advises universities on admissions, and a former director at admissions service Ucas, said: “Ucas hasn’t released any official data yet, but I have been told that over 10,000 applicants with predicted grades of BBB are not holding a firm offer at any university. That is really shocking.”

Pupils predicted BBB at A-level are generally regarded as strong university candidates. But with elite Russell Group institutions giving out fewer offers or raising their entry requirements in popular subjects including law, medicine and psychology, Hargreaves said these grades will not have been good enough to net an offer on many top university courses this year. Pupils can apply to five universities, but Hargreaves thinks many BBB students have pitched their choices too high.

“This is a big failure of information and advice,” he said. “We’ve been saying for the past decade that it is a buyer’s market, but the environment has now changed, and Ucas and advisers in schools really need to be stressing that.” Hargreaves said it was fine for students to aim high by applying to “stretching” universities, but they should also have an insurance choice at a university that required lower grades.

He suspects that some 3B students may be “holding out” for clearing in August, hoping they will be able to pick up a last-minute place at a top university. But, he warned: “I think they will be disappointed. I have 12 Russell Group clients and all are telling me they won’t be in clearing.”

Last summer, some selective universities were left scrambling to find bedrooms, seminar space and staff, after thousands of extra students got the high A-level grades they needed to secure their place.

The Ucas chief executive, Clare Marchant, wrote in a blog on Wednesday that the proportion of applications to so-called “higher-tariff” universities resulting in an offer had fallen from 60.5% in 2021 to 55.1% this year.
Prof Colin Riordan, vice-chancellor of Cardiff University, a member of the Russell Group, said: “It’s absolutely clear that this has been a competitive year for applicants. We’ve increased our entry requirements in areas at risk of being oversubscribed.”

He said Cardiff had expanded capacity in some subjects during the pandemic and “we can’t just keep on growing”.
He added: “It is also going to be much more difficult for us this year to help people who miss their offer by a grade, especially in popular subjects.”

Mike Nicholson, deputy head of education services at Cambridge University, said: “Most selective universities have been more cautious as they don’t want to get caught out for a third year in a row.”

Nicholson said that teachers had become used to many universities “saying one thing about what grades they will accept, and then in reality being prepared to drop the grade if they want someone”. He thinks that many don’t realise this has changed at leading universities.

He said: “I don’t blame teachers. They often try to be realistic with students, but ultimately the choice of where to apply rests with applicants who can be influenced by peer or parental views.”

Experts say, though, that disappointed applicants should think hard before deciding to put it all off until next year. Nick Hillman, director of the Higher Education Policy Institute thinktank, said: “If this year’s applicants think they’ve got it tough, next year’s pressure could well be worse, as there will be more 18-year-olds again.”

He added: “Students and parents need to know that there are really good courses throughout the sector, and not just at the most prestigious universities.”

THE GUARDIAN

BASIC Education minister Angie Motshekga has announced several changes to national assessments and subjects at the schools in South Africa.

Presenting her department’s budget vote in the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) on Wednesday (15 June), Motshekga announced that Khoi, Nama, San and sign languages will officially be introduced as additional subjects in South Africa’s school curriculum.

The minister also provided further details about the proposed policy shift to promote mother-tongue teaching and learning in schools.

“We increased the number of languages in the sector. We have added additional languages in our list of subjects; they are Khoi, Nama, San as well as African sign languages.

“Had it not been for the disruptions of Covid-19, the introduction of Swahili in our schools would have started. We are still pursuing it and Tanzania and Kenya are willing to assist us to finalise plans to introduce the language in South African schools,” she said.

Language shift

Motshekga also told the house that it was time for South Africa to begin a serious debate on mother-tongue teaching and learning, as currently children only learn in their mother tongue until grade three and then switch to English or Afrikaans as a medium for learning.

“More than 80% of children continue to learn in a language that is not their mother tongue. I think we are the only continent teaching children in a language that is not their home language, and this continues to contribute to under-achievement and poor performance. We must have a policy shift in this area,” she said.

Motshekga gave an example of the Eastern Cape province, which has piloted mother-tongue teaching from grades 4 to 12. “It is showing that learners who have been taught in their mother tongue perform better. Other provinces are on their way and we will report soon about progress in mother-tongue instruction in our schools,” she said.

The minister added that if children have to read with meaning by the age of 10, they should do this in their mother tongue, like every other child in the world, rather than expect them to read with meaning in a language they do not understand.

New certificate 

The minister also announced that the department will be introducing a general education certificate for grade 9. It is being piloted in 268 schools nationally and in 2023 it will be expanded to all districts.

The GEC is intended to formally recognise learners’ achievements at the end of the compulsory phase of schooling. Its primary purpose is to facilitate subject choices beyond Grade 9 and articulation between schools and TVET colleges.

Under the current system, hundreds of students leave the school system each year without a qualification, hindering them from finding jobs, the department said.

While the department has reiterated that this is not an exit point for learners from the school system, the certificate will provide better decision-making for learners, especially those who may shift focus to more technical subjects and trades instead of a singular focus on a college or university education.

BUSINESS TECH

THE next phase in the development of early learning social franchise SmartStart’s WhatsApp chatbot is to ensure it also provides parental support.

This is according to Ebrahim Vally, chief product officer at Helm, speaking to ITWeb about what’s in the pipeline for the early childhood development (ECD) chatbot.

Formerly Praekelt Consulting, Helm helped SmartStart develop its multilingual WhatsApp chatbot named ‘Funda’, which means to ‘learn’. The chatbot automates a lot of the admin that ECD learning practitioners encounter in their daily activities, giving them time to focus on the more important parts of their work.

This includes the ability to register children using simple-to-follow points via the bot, complete attendance registers at the end of each week, look at lessons, plan activities, as well as access educational resources.

Vally indicates the chatbot was first only for ECD caregivers. However, Helm is looking at different options of offering similar information to parents as well.

“In that time when they’re in a taxi, for example, parents can look at the content, prepare and have ideas about what they’ll need to spend time teaching their child in the evening at home.

“That’s one of the things that hopefully we should be able to launch soon,” Vally notes.

Established in 2015, SmartStart aims to provide quality early learning for children aged three to five. Its franchised programme is delivered through playgroups, day mothers and ECD centres, to improve children’s readiness for learning and school performance.

In addition, it allows franchisees, known as SmartStarters, to run their own SmartStart programmes within their communities.

According to Vally, SmartStart identified there was a gap within the three to five age group, with about one million children with no access to early learning initiatives.

SmartStart approached Helm to find a way to make it easier for franchisees and caregivers to gain access to the content, information and registration.

“They approached us and we came up with the chatbot. The reason we went with WhatsApp was we felt it would be the easiest way to get adoption for the franchisees located in really rural areas and in places where connectivity is an issue.

“Also, when we did our research and user testing, it [WhatsApp] was something that we found was easily acceptable and would be adopted by the franchisees.”

The chatbot aims to save a person time and money spent on transport to upload an attendance register in order to get their stipend, he points out. “Not only that, but we can now offer the collateral and content for the training, the daily activities, etc.”
The content on the chatbot is available in all 11 official South African languages.

“It’s not just translating English into Setswana; there are some changes that needed to be done, in order to really fully get the context of what a specific sentence might say. It’s important to carry the full context of the translation over. We decided to do that in all official languages as a start, especially for the content about the training.”

SmartStart’s WhatsApp chatbot has over 4 000 unique users/practitioners, with a retention rate of 71%, according to the company. It also has 1.54 million automated interactions to assist practitioners.

Currently reaching 103 000 children, SmartStart has a target of reaching one million, which Helm is fully behind, adds Vally.

“We’re trying to work together with SmartStart but the issue we currently face is that there’s a limitation on connectivity and devices. At the moment, the cost of data and connectivity is really high. The introduction of a lower cost device will allow more engagement.

“If we can overcome these barriers, it will make adoption a lot faster and allow us to reach that goal and also increase the amount of franchisees – it will almost double the amount of users on this specific platform,” he concludes.

ITWEB|

ADEOYE O. AKINOLA

Post-colonial African states and their universities have refused to be seriously committed to the deconstruction of higher education curricula. South Africa is not an exception.

While successive post-apartheid administrations have tried to implement policies to stem the tide of knowledge dependency and prioritise the transformation agenda, the curriculum of universities continues to reflect western hegemony. From the 1995 National Commission on Higher Education to the 1996 Green Paper on Higher Education Transformation as well as the 1997 White Paper on the transformation of higher education, none have resulted in an effective curriculum reconstruction.

The outcomes-based education upon which the transformation agenda is constructed, focuses on increasing the quality of education, and not necessarily on expanding access to education. It was a goal-driven educational template.

Reinforcing the importance of higher education, the Green Paper notes that higher education equips people with the required knowledge, understanding, skills, and value system to become decisive actors “in a wide range of social roles and to become effective citizens”.

The country has attempted to devise an internally constructed template without success. It is thus important to draw lessons from other African countries. The launch of From Ivory Towers to Ebony Towers: Transforming Humanities Curricula in South Africa, Africa and African-American Studies was organised by the University of Johannesburg’s Institute for PanAfrican Thought and Conversation on June 8 in Pretoria. The book contributes to the discourse on transforming and interrogating western hegemonic structures that persist in higher education in Africa and attempts to shape the perceptions of policymakers.

Twenty-one stakeholders, including experts on curriculum transformation and senior officials of the Department of Higher Education and Training discussed South Africa’s effort to deconstruct universities’ curricula. Knowledge dependency, censorship, and dismissal of African history have been an integral part of the conversation around knowledge production in Africa, where the university curriculum has replicated the Eurocentric templates.

In the 1950s and ’60s, there were struggles against the dismantling of the African curriculum due to the exposure of African students to European universities. African scholars like Kenneth Dike from the Ibadan School of History, and others from the Dar es Salaam School of Political Economy and the Dakar School of Culture, began to advocate for African-driven epistemology.

These schools also adopted historiography, political philosophy, and other African knowledge systems drawn from conventional knowledge. Apart from Africa, India’s integrated, and cross-discipline approach to learning also offered an alternative framework as opposed to the westernisation of knowledge.

Universities in Africa were also caught in the post-colonial African “sympathy” for the universalism of westernisation, as giant transformative efforts of these schools of thought disappeared, while schools of higher learning such as the University of Dar es Salaam, University of Ibadan, and the University of Dakar, continue to reinforce Eurocentric thoughts. This stems from the infamous “black inferiority” conversation, promoted by some scholars to undermine African-generated scholarships.

Apart from Africa’s importation of economic and political systems of the West, the educational template reinforces acute dependency and western hegemony. Books such as Claude Ake’s Social Science as Imperialism try to emphasise the abandonment of the African knowledge system and confront knowledge dependency.

The accelerated infusion of western knowledge and digital technologies into production processes, consciously or unconsciously, enhances the predominant of Eurocentric knowledge production, to the detriment of Africa. Indeed, Africa has become the dumping ground for western knowledge, technology, and values.

Led by the editors of the book, Oluwaseun Tella and Shireen Motala, the meeting questions the use of “indigenous” for the African knowledge system. Unfortunately, many African academics and writers have continued to use such captions for knowledge generated in Africa.

The universities established during colonialism and apartheid were designed as the production hub for regime consolidations and the projection of the western value system. Therefore, based on the existing university curriculum in South Africa and post-colonial African societies, the universities are not African universities but “Universities in Africa”.

It is important for South African universities to enter the global knowledge system on their own terms by setting the agenda and producing knowledge that relates to their context and not the global precedent that has already been established.

The government needs the required political strong will to achieve the transformation agenda.

* Akinola is the Head of Research and Teaching at the University of Johannesburg’s Institute for Pan-African Thought and Conversation.

POLICE in the North West are searching for suspects, after the body a 21-year-old student was found in his room at one of the students’ residences at the North West University’s Mahikeng Campus two weeks ago.

Police spokesperson Colonel Amanda Funani says information received, indicates that the victim’s body was found lying on his bed by a friend.

The victim was reportedly last seen last week Friday with his friends.

Funani has called on anyone with information to contact the Mmabatho Police Station.

She says, “The parents became suspicious after failing to reach their son on his cell phone on Saturday and Sunday morning. The university security managed to open the victim’s room and he was found lying dead on his bed. Initially, an inquest docket was registered, but it was changed to murder after a preliminary post-mortem report revealed that the victim died due to head and multiply body injuries.”

The North West University says it will provide support to the investigating team.

It has named the victim as Onkgopotse Kgeletsane.

It says counselling has been provided to fellow students.

Meanwhile, a 39-year- old man has stabbed to death his female partner of the same age at Maelula village outside Louis Trichardt in Limpopo.

Police spokesperson Brigadier Motlafela Mojapelo says the man later hung himself at his parent’s home at the neighbouring Murunwa village.

The body of the deceased woman, Phumudzo Mukhatho, was found with several stab wounds.

The deceased man has been identified as Edson Nematswerani.

Police suspect domestic related dispute as being behind incident.

STAFF REPORTER

VODACOM has launched a follow-up to its stimulating #CodeLikeAGirl programme that will see 700 girls between the ages of 14 and 18 receive coding training from 27 June – 15 July 2022.

The Vodacom #CodeLikeAGirl programme is aimed at inspiring more girls to explore careers that require coding skills to help them get a start in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields and industries.

Often referred to as the jobs of the future, STEM drives innovation, social wellbeing, inclusive growth, and sustainable development the world over.

Female participation is lagging in STEM fields in most countries. A report by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco), titled “Cracking the code: Girls’ and women’s education in STEM” indicated only 35% of STEM students in higher education globally are women. Young women also comprise only 25% of students in engineering or information and communication technology (ICT).

Njabulo Mashigo, HR director for Vodacom South Africa, says: “Gender norms, culture and stereotypes are still shaping girls’ choices about their studies and their eventual careers, which is why so few consider STEM and ICT careers. We need to create more opportunities for girls and young women to build confidence in STEM, by empowering them through education and coding skills, so they can become the engineers and innovators of the future. Our vision is to address the underrepresentation of women and girls in STEM education and careers. Through this initiative, we are looking to improve on these numbers, and empower even more women to explore STEM careers.”

Coding is the process of transforming ideas, solutions, and instructions into a language that the computer can understand, using programming languages like Javascript, Java, C/C++, or Python, to act as the translator between humans and machines.

The “Code like a Girl” programme aims to develop not only coding skills but also valuable life skills for girls aged between 14-18 years and encourages them to consider careers in ICT and STEM. It provides authoritative mentors for the girls to inspire them to be passionate about technology and its possibilities.

During the week-long training course, pupils will be exposed to knowledge of computer languages, robotics and development programmes including HTML, CSS, GitHub and Version control, Bootstrap and JavaScript, Basic Computer and Introduction to Coding. They will also be taken on a fun and empowering life skills journey while developing coding, presentation, and communication skills.

At the end of the week, each girl will know how to develop her own website and present her work to the rest of the coding class. The programme was first implemented in South Africa, Mozambique, Tanzania, DRC and Lesotho in 2017. In SA alone, since the programme was launched, Vodacom has trained 2 332 girls. It had its biggest intake in 2021, with over 1 000 pupils from eight provinces taking part. Vodacom aims to train1 500 girls from across all nine provinces in the current financial year. This investment by Vodacom in digital skills training programmes for young women will help to narrow the gender digital divide at an early age in South Africa.

Mashigo says: “Projects such as Vodacom’s #CodeLikeAGirl have the potential to significantly close the gender gap and inspire young girls to pursue STEM careers in the digital era towards which we are transitioning. I believe that we can ultimately change the outlook of the number of women in STEM careers, helping them to shape the future.” 

SUPPLIED

JULIAN BROWN|

ON the morning of Wednesday, 16 June 1976, young students from schools across Soweto set out on a march through the sprawling black township outside Johannesburg. The march was to amplify their opposition to the apartheid government’s new school-language policy that would see Afrikaans replace English as their main medium of instruction in several key subjects.

Before the march began, they were confident. They knew the risks that they faced – “we decided that there should be no placard inciting the police as such, one activist put it afterwards, because “we wanted a peaceful demonstration – it had to be disciplined”. Even so, they were excited, believing that the march would be a carnivalesque event, “a Guy Fawkes thing,” as one put it – an event in which the world would be turned upside down.

Their excitement buoyed them in the early hours of the morning, as thousands of students joined in the march. But this atmosphere did not last.

A few hours into the march, heavily-armed members of the South African Police confronted a crowd of students near the Orlando West High School. They fired tear-gas at the students, and then, moments later, fired live ammunition. In the moments that followed, they shot and killed Hector Pieterson an eleven-year old child. As if energised by this death, the police continued to assault and kill students.

In the hours that followed, another 10 people died at the hands of the police. Over the next three days, at least 138 people died. And the deaths did not stop. Throughout the rest of the year, the police and military would patrol Soweto and many other sites of popular resistance, and use whatever force they deemed necessary to suppress dissent, quash protest, and establish order.

These protests reignited the public flame of resistance, and helped re-make the opposition to apartheid. They provided a model and an example for activists to follow into the 1980s.

June 16 in perspective

Today, 46 years later, South Africa commemorates June 16th as National Youth Day.

It is no doubt important to do this, and to remember the sacrifices and struggles of the past. But in commemorating this day, South Africa runs the risk of sacralising these events – of lifting them out of their historical context, stripping them of their political complexities, and remaking them into a mere symbol, something that only needs to be remembered once a year and then forgotten the rest of the time.

In my book, published on the eve of the 40th anniversary of June 16th, The Road to Soweto, I argued that the sacralisation of this singular day has distorted understandings of South Africa’s post-apartheid democracy.

It is now almost trite to suggest that the political order of post-apartheid South Africa was forged in conference rooms and around negotiating tables in the 1990s; that the conversations, debates, and arguments between the representatives of the negotiating parties are what shaped the terms of the country’s political institutions and laws; and that the country constitution is best understood as the product of an elite idealism. All of this is at least partially true.

What is wrong with this vision is that it leaves out the role of ordinary people taking to the streets –- the role of protest, of marches, of popular organisation, dissent, discordance, creativity, and struggle –- in making the post-apartheid democratic order.

It presumes that the state is the beginning and the end of the political order; that democracy is only achievable through representation; and it presumes that “the people” are a political resource to be deployed by elite actors (whether these be politicians or intellectuals, revolutionaries or revanchists) and not a source of political ideas in themselves.

But this is not true.

Making democracy

While democracy may be encouraged and entrenched through institutions and ideas, it is first made through action. The students who marched on 16 June 1976 did more than simply register a political opinion.

They enacted an alternate form of politics. By gathering and marching together, and by acting together they constituted themselves as political agents – as people who already possessed the kind of agency that the apartheid state denied they could ever claim. And by marching side-by-side – regardless of their age and gender, status and authority – they constituted themselves as a democratic force, as a community of equals.

As I’ve argued before, this form of politics is not merely a product of the past, not merely a product of the anti-apartheid struggle. Instead, it has marked – and still marks – popular dissent and democratic organising in South Africa since the end of apartheid.

Over the past two decades, such forms of popular democracy have marked the struggles of Abahlali baseMjondolo, a shack-dwellers movement that organises in informal settlements across South Africa. It has driven the activism of the Treatment Action Campaign, and its grassroots work to force the state to provide anti-retroviral medication. And it has led to labour activists, unions, and other communities achieving significant changes in the platinum mining industry.

The roots of democracy lie in these actions, in these claims to agency and equality. These acts are themselves rooted in a complex pattern of joy and anger – in the desire to turn the world upside-down, and emerge out of specific historical and social contexts. But they can transcend these moments. They can open up a channel, create a model, and instigate a revolution.

In other words: if the events of 16 June 1976 are seen as an ongoing part of the process of constituting democracy in South Africa, then we can see it as part of contemporary political struggles – and not just as an historical event, safely sealed away in the past.

The marches, protests, and pickets that mark contemporary South Africa are the source of a continually-renewing (and, perhaps, continually-mutating) democracy. The institutions of the state may shape the ways in which this democracy develops, but they do not create it. “The people” make politics.

At this moment, as South Africa’s political elites continue to be mired in scandal, as the state bureaucracy struggles to fulfil its functions, and as scholars and activists question the legitimacy of the constitutional settlement, the anniversary of the uprising of 16 June 1976 in an opportunity to think about what post-apartheid democracy can mean.

It does not only mean the forms and institutions that define the democratic state. It must also mean the ongoing acts of ordinary people, the acts that assert and imagine democracy on the streets over and again.

(Julian Brown Associate Professor of Political Studies, University of the Witwatersrand)

THE CONVERSATION