Universities to work together now

LIMPOPO – TWO Limpopo universities, the University of Limpopo (UL) and the University of Venda (Univen) announced their new partnership with the University of the Witwatersrand (WITS) on Friday. The executive management of the three universities, led by Wits vice-chancellor, Prof Adam Habib, Univen vice-chancellor, Prof Peter Mbati, and UL vice-chancellor, Prof Mahlo Mokgalong signed a memorandum of agreement on strategic partnership in the areas of research and postgraduate studies, teaching and learning as well as community engagement.

The partnership would focus on specific academic projects in the areas of engineering, health, education, mathematics and social sciences. It would also include employee mentoring and capacity building, student exchanges and access to research and teaching facilities at Wits’ rural campuses in Mpumalanga.

This follows years of individual academics collaborations in different disciplines at the three universities, which prompted a need to formalise and strengthen the agreement.

The formal partnership negotiation negotiations between the three institutions started gaining momentum last year.

A major benefit of this initiative was that it made more effective use of declining research and teaching resources and, through reciprocated arrangement, contributed to advancing the educational, economic and social development needs as espoused in the National Development Plan.

Habib commented said the initiative did not only support the strategic goals of the three universities, but also manifested the need for greater cooperation and collaboration between neighbouring higher education institutions, post-democracy.

“This is an exciting project for Wits and speaks directly to our objectives of being a globally competitive and simultaneously, a local responsive institution,” he said.

Mbati said although Univen was a rural based university; it had a vision to become a leading regional university with a strong service orientation.

“This collaboration is an important initiative in not only achieving this objective, but continuing to grow its research base.”

Mokgalong said the UL took great pride in this partnership. “We believe that these academics will exchange ideas to empower communities and students at these three institutions,” he said.