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<span>Nzimande picks team to drive change at varsities</span>
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<span>Ten-member committee set up to monitor progress at all public tertiary education institutions</span>
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11 July 2017 - 05:53
<span id="gmail-authors" class="gmail-heading-author">Bekezela Phakathi</span>
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<a class="gmail-image" href="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/BRq-laOoSsdxrEibgnvvdDujqeMa3Zq2VJ7JCNylEivUNBoaOEXlg3W2yDrKAqyQeK7AKTwtrmLd6xJprW2c7vxcjBW8FsU=s1200" style="padding-top:66.6016%">
<img src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/BRq-laOoSsdxrEibgnvvdDujqeMa3Zq2VJ7JCNylEivUNBoaOEXlg3W2yDrKAqyQeK7AKTwtrmLd6xJprW2c7vxcjBW8FsU=s750" alt="Social cohesion: Students mingle on the campus at the University of Cape Town. The government has appointed a committee to accelerate transformation at South African universities. Picture: SUPPLIED">
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Social cohesion: Students mingle on the campus
at the University of Cape Town. The government has appointed a committee
to accelerate transformation at South African universities. Picture:
SUPPLIED
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<p>Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande
has established a 10-member committee to fast-track transformation in
the tertiary sector.</p>
<p>Nzimande’s department has been looking to accelerate transformation
in universities, including setting clear targets and indicators.</p>
<p>The demographics of the professoriate should be radically changed,
discrimination eliminated and student success and support improved,
according to the department.</p>
<p>President Jacob Zuma has signed the Higher Education Amendment Act,
which gives Nzimande more powers to intervene in university matters. The
law gives the minister the power to determine transformation objectives
and put mechanisms in place to ensure the objectives are met.</p>
<p>It also empowers the minister to withhold funding under specific circumstances.</p>
<p>The transformation oversight committee had been appointed for a three-year term, Nzimande said in the Government Gazette.</p>
<p>The committee will be chaired by Prof André Keet, a director of the
International Institute for Studies in Race, Reconciliation and Social
Justice at the University of the Free State. It will monitor progress on
transformation in public universities, serve as an expert advisory
body, provide independent advice to the minister and the department in
fulfilling their oversight roles and assist in strengthening the
accountability of universities when it comes to transformation goals.</p>
<p>It will also conduct an assessment of the effect of language policies on institutional culture and social integration.</p>
<p>"Such transformation involves the improvement of the quality of
teaching and learning; the elimination of weak administrative systems,
especially at historically disadvantaged universities; the elimination
of discriminatory practices based on gender, race, class and historical
imbalances; the provision of adequate infrastructure so that all
universities can meet their mandates in the context of social cohesion,"
Nzimande said.</p>
<p>In 2008, Naledi Pandor, who was education minister at the time,
appointed a ministerial committee on transformation and social cohesion
following a racism incident at a University of Free State hostel. That
committee observed that racism and sexism were pervasive, and that the
pace of redress was painfully slow. It noted serious disjunction between
policy and real-life experiences of students and staff in learning,
teaching, curriculum, languages, residence life and governance. In its
report, the committee recommended that the minister consider
establishing a permanent oversight committee to monitor the
transformation of higher education.</p>
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