The Centre for International Teacher Education (CITE) recently hosted the Symposium on Teaching for Social Justice: 2023 at Cape Town Hotel School, Granger Bay Campus.

The Symposium’s theme was: In Pursuit of Equity: Disrupting Social Injustice in Higher Education in South Africa in a Post-COVID Era. CITE Director, Prof Zayd Waghid said the symposium was aimed to facilitate the discussion of ideas and perspectives that can transform and re-evaluate the prevailing discourses concerning social justice within education. “It presented a valuable opportunity to engage in innovative discourse, derive fresh insights, and establish collaborative networks,” observed Waghid. The symposium was established in 2023 under the leadership of Waghid, the current interim South African Research Chairs Initiative (SARChI) Chair. It is envisaged that the symposium will be held annually at CPUT.

In his opening address, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor in Research, Technology, Innovation and Partnerships, Dr David Phaho revealed that earlier this year, the CPUT Council approved the business plan to turn CITE from a Centre to an Institute henceforth to be called The Global Institute for Teacher Education and Society (GITES). The new entity is envisaged to focus on multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary research and innovation. “It would be the first of its kind in Southern Africa and aims to generate knowledge in the social sciences with a particular focus on building and promoting scholars and scholarship in the Global South.

“I do not doubt that the newly established institutes will continue to build on the exemplary legacy of CITE and continue to host these types of critical engagements albeit under a different name and a much broader academic agenda,” Phaho remarked.

He added that the drive for access to higher education for all deserving students is topical in South Africa and “beyond our borders”. “If there is one thing the COVID-19 has exposed, is the gross inequalities which not only exist between the Global South and Global North in terms of access to life-saving vaccines and other interventions.”

Prof Kirti Meno from University of Johannesburg provided a presentation on: Pedagogical Continuities in Teaching and Learning in a ‘supercomplex’ higher education system. Meno said demands on higher education in South Africa have resulted in universities having to respond to the multiplicity of needs of the new South Africa while still grappling with the constraints of the apartheid regime.

University of Cape Town Professor, Joanne Hardman’s presentation was on: A Vygotskian approach to decolonial pedagogy: Back to the future. Virtually, Prof Yusuf Sayed from Cambridge University, provided a presentation on: Crises, Education Policy and Teacher Education: Towards a social justice agenda. The symposium was supported financially by the South African National Research Foundation, and it successfully offered critical insights pertaining to policy and practice that included critical perspectives from both the plenary speakers and the audience. “The diverse audience, including academics across various faculties, undergraduate and postgraduate students and certain department officials in the Western Cape government, can further be attributed to the symposium's success,” said Waghid.

Furthermore, Waghid said a significant highlight of the event was the discussion by Phaho concerning the CITE, which would transition into a new entity called the GITES and would house three Chairs, namely the SARChI Chair, and two CPUT funded Chairs. “This is a significant aspect for the university as it corroborates its commitment to further advancing research capacity and output in international teacher education.”

Written by Aphiwe Boyce

Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

The Faculty of Education’s Prof Zayd Waghid has been selected for the prestigious Fulbright Visiting Scholarship for the 2023/24 academic year.

Waghid’s host institution will be Cornell University in New York, which is ranked as one of the top universities globally.

“It’s something that I have worked hard towards achieving, from writing a comprehensive project application to being interviewed and then finally being selected, based on the decision of the Fulbright Committee in Washington. It’s such a competitive programme in which only around 900 scholars from around the globe are selected.”

Distinguished Professor, N’Dri Thérèse Assié-Lumumba will host Waghid in the Africana Studies and Research Centre from March 2024 to September 2024.

“It is an incredible opportunity to develop further academically by working with the top experts in my field of research, socially and culturally, within a US context, where there is significant diversity in terms of the broader cohort of academics, students and communities. I do see this as mutual in establishing relationships with universities in the US and SA higher education context. It’s an opportunity for me to advance my research which has implications for my teaching since they are intertwined, i.e. teaching informs research and vice versa.”

Elaborating on the focus of his research, Waghid said that In South Africa, there is a dearth of academic programmes that offer Global Citizenship Education (GCE) as a comprehensive curriculum in the humanities and social sciences. In the Faculty of Education at several universities of technology (UoTs), GCE is largely absent from existing curricula, especially in teacher education where pre-service teachers are trained for schools.

“Most UoTs appear to focus more on subject-specific disciplines with little emphasis on interdisciplinarity. While students in the Faculty of Education are trained in their respective disciplines, there is a lack of adequate skills, knowledge and values, which I contend prospective teachers ought to develop to transition in a “glocalised context,” Waghid continued.

“This has significant implications concerning the school learners that are taught in schools, the schools remaining significantly localised and adequate integration in a global environment.”

He said this was in contrast to what is happening at several universities in the US where GCE is offered as an integrated course in a structured programme that is very much aligned with achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

“Research concerning GCE is at a far more developed phase than what is currently happening in SA. I see visiting Cornell as an opportunity to advance my knowledge and experience with GCE, which is still in its infancy stage in SA. Cornell’s relationship with the communities and other universities makes it an apposite host in further exploring the structured service learning and work-integrated learning programmes I believe would be beneficial to developing the GCE curriculum in South Africa.”

Written by Ilse Fredericks

Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

CPUT proudly opened its doors recently for the Global Institute for Teacher Education and Society (GITES) Annual Symposium of Teaching for Social Justice.

The theme of the symposium, held at the Cape Town Hotel School, Granger Bay Campus. was: Examining and envisioning education in South Africa from current inequalities to future equities – addressing social justice and inclusivity in pursuit of a ‘good society’.

Prof Zayd Waghid, Acting Director: GITES, CPUT, delivered the opening remarks and outlined the role of GITES. Waghid said the GITES Annual Symposium on Teaching for Social Justice was started in 2023. “The symposium aims to provide a platform for experts in the field of social justice education to engage in discourse around the need to transform society through pragmatic and innovative ways at the micro, meso and macro levels. The symposium aims to create an awareness of the need to disrupt comfort levels of t prevalent in various education contexts.”

He added that the symposium focuses on bringing students at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels, in-service teachers and government officials, by creating spaces for meaningful dialogue by bringing theory and rigorous research to practice and policy.

Keynote speakers included: Prof Jonathan Jansen from Stellenbosch University; Prof Thaddeus Metz, from the University of Pretoria, and Dr Savo Heleta, from Durban University of Technology.

In his presentation, Jansen gave reasons “why professors of education should not teach future teachers”. “We have not taught in schools for decades. We norm our teaching on middle-class school standards. We frontload teacher education with theory and literature, he continued.

“Because of these factors we are far removed from the routines of management and teaching in working-class schools.”

Heleta delivered his presentation on Eurocentric education under coloniality and neoliberalism: How to envision socially just and decolonised education in South Africa? He said decolonisation was not even a footnote. “Most university leaders, academia, and policymakers weren’t bothered with the coloniality of knowledge and colonial and apartheid-era curriculum that continued long after 1994. Epistemic decolonisation became a buzzword in South African higher education in 2015-2016, primarily due to student activism under the #RhodesMustFall and #FeesMustFall banners.”

Metz, a Research Professor of Philosophy, made a presentation on Being Excluded from Knowledge for Its Own Sake: An Underappreciated Injustice.

Reflecting on the event, Dr Yohana William said the topic that Jansen presented was important at the current juncture where South Africa, as many other developing countries, “is still battling with redressing the current inequalities in education for future equities and pursuit of a good society as the symposium theme suggests”.

William said the education system is not neutral. “It is a tool or an instrument that reproduces and exacerbates the existing inequalities and classes through both the existing pedagogies and political/hegemonic decisions characterising the schooling process (what is and what is not).”

Meanwhile, Dr Andrew Wambua said Jansen stated that love and connection matter more than correct teaching. And that consistency in school management is key. He said according to Metz, if qualified people cannot access higher education, then that is injustice. “Education should reach masses and should not be offered just for the sake of it.” He added that Heleta urged the attendees to decolonise “our curriculum and thinking”. “Education remains deeply segregated. Societal inequalities are often on display at and between universities. There is a need for critical pedagogy and decoloniality to resist neoliberalism, coloniality, and Eurocentric hegemony.”

In his take-ways, Dr Adedayo Theodorio said Heleta pointed out that multilayered injustices are happening across the globe and that the injustices in many ways influence higher education. “Challenges such as the absence of justice, oppression, and dissociations in South Africa’s society remain a sickening root cause of inequality in the society and higher education.”

Theodorio said the Department of Higher Education and Training should consider decolonisation fully instead of neoliberal visions. “SA universities could consider collaborating with local universities in SA instead of entirely collaborating with foreign universities.”

Written by Aphiwe Boyce
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Delegates from more than 30 institutions participated in the 2024 Higher Education Quality Assurance Forum (HEQAF), recently held at the Cape Town Hotel School.

The three-day event was hosted by CPUT, in partnership with the University of South Africa, under the theme: Quality as Transformation - Looking Back to The Future of Quality Assurance in Higher Education.

The forum sought to explore insights into the relationship between quality and transformation with an understanding of the need for a transformed higher education landscape, and that higher education quality is pivotal to higher education transformation.

The delegates were welcomed by Dr Siyanda Makaula, CPUT’s Director: Quality Management Directorate and chairperson of the HEQAF organising committee.

“What we are trying to unpack is that quality without transformation is not quality and transformation without quality is not transformation,” he said.

The event delved into four sub-themes:

• Quality as Transformation
• Transformation of leadership, governance and management of the quality function
• Student engagement and student voice(s): essential elements for a quality student learning journey
• Quality assurance and technology in higher education

Prof Driekie Hay-Swemmer, Executive Director in the Office of the Vice-Chancellor, delivered a message of support from the Vice-Chancellor’s Office.

“Together let us champion a transformative agenda that empowers our institutions and enriches the lives of learners across the nation.”

Unisa’s Prof Luvuyo Lumkile Lalendle delivered a message of support on behalf of the Office of the Vice-Chancellor: Unisa.

“As we deliberate today let it be about the students, not about us. It is important to unmute the student voice at our campuses and make each day count for them. Our universities need to deal with student segmentation and tailor-made intervention to facilitate quality learning and support for the brightest stars of our population and our generation. This workshop must preoccupy itself with what is worth knowing and doing in the quality space,” said Lalendle.

The forum included a combination of keynote addresses, abstract presentations by delegates, panel discussions, and reflections on practices aimed to stimulate discussions on the theme.

The speakers included Makaula, Lalendle, Dr Violet Makuku (Director - Global Quality Assurance Association), Dr Britta Zawada (Director: Institutional Audits at the Council on Higher Education), Olivia Mokgatle (Executive Director: Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation at Walter Sisulu University), Prof Sandile Songca (Head of the Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology at the University of Zululand, who formerly served as Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Teaching and Learning at UKZN) and Prof Zayd Waghid (CPUT Faculty of Education).

Written by Ilse Fredericks

Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.