South Africa - Sweden Research and Innovation Week

This two day workshops focuses on the pedagogic and administrative aspects of developing and delivering Laboratory Animal Science Education, in a co-operation between South African universities and organisations, and the Sweden based learning co-operative NCLASET with its member universities. The first day is dedicated to the pedagogic aspects of e-learning, the development of web-based learning modules, and the second day is dedicated to the practical aspects of e-learning administration.

Keywords: E-learning, learning platform, curriculum delivery . Venue: University of Cape Town
Contact details:  Bert Mohr, bert.mohr@uct.ac.za, +27 (0)76 541 3929 | +27 (0)21 406 6095  

Work Integrated Learning (WIL) assumes and requires cooperation between stakeholders, namely the university, student and society. WIL approaches develop new knowledge and skills related to an ever-changing societal context and global citizenry. As a curriculum matter, WIL is thus a vehicle that is ideally suited to transform the curriculum and bridge divides that could also enable us to find international answers to very local challenges.

This workshop invites participation in and contributions towards the following topics:
1. Societal advancement through WIL
2. WIL as pedagogy to transform education
3. WIL strategies to enhance the employability of students
4. WIL for Global education and learning
5. Researching WIL
6. Best practices for the application of WIL

Presentation format: 20 minute presentations with 10 minutes for questions/discussion.
Venue: University of the Western Cape. 1H - School of Public Health
Contact details:  
Dr Henri Jacobs, hjacobs@cut.ac.za
Ms Mesha Moses, mlmoses@uwc.ac.za
Prof Per Assmo, passmo@uwc.ac.za & per.assmo@hv.se

Five universities, two from Sweden and three from South Africa will come together and collaborate on strengthening the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in teacher education. Each of the partners in this proposal is also connected to a local level network which involves a range of postgraduate scholars, new and emerging academics and researchers, civil society and community partners. We plan to host conference activities linked to the partners meetings which will be designed as research capacity development initiatives for the participating researchers, doctoral and masters scholars, new and emerging academics.

Collaboration activities for discussion will include facilitating knowledge and cultural exchange by researchers and post graduate students through:
• Exchange of cultural practices
• Co-supervision of research projects
• Collaborative research and article writing
• Researching across contexts: Scandinavia-RSA
• Supervision/researcher/student exchange visits

Keywords: Sustainable Development Goals, Education for Sustainable Development, Transformative Education.
Venue: University of South Africa - Pretoria
Contact details:  
Prof Soul Shava, soul.shava@gmail.com, + 27 78 695 4153
Prof Nokhanyo N. Mdzanga, Nokhanyo.Mdzanga@mandela.ac.za, +27 41 504 4564/1195

There are many challenges to doctoral education in a developing field, e.g. emergency medicine. Owing to limited healthcare resources, PhD candidates can be the only emergency care clinicians in their city or country. Therefor, on-line courses and courses at a distance are necessary to make it possible to pursue a PhD.

The aim of this symposium is to discuss what is required of an “online PhD program” in order to meet both the needs of the PhD student with respect to distance learning and supervision, and at the same time guarantee a high quality of the PhD program.

Venue: Cape Town
Contact details: Willem Stassen, willem.stassen@uct.ac.za

The Open Education and Social Justice (OESJ) initiative is a SASUF-funded collaboration
aimed at promoting a more equitable, contextually-appropriate approach to education. The
primary deliverables of the project are to conduct a collaborative literature review and develop
a detailed project proposal to facilitate further research and implementation work in this area.
The project also has an explicit capacity development component in terms of mentoring
emerging open education researchers and conducting information-sharing sessions with
institutional stakeholders. There is also an imperative to scope and identify possible
collaborators for longer-term open textbook implementation and research case studies.
This satellite event is intended as an opportunity for OESJ researchers to undertake
collaborative work in developing the conceptual framework that will inform the research design
and methodological approach of the longer-term scoped project.

The second, “open”, component of the satellite workshop will take place on the afternoon of
Tuesday 7 May. It will be used as an opportunity to:

• Engage open education and/or social justice researchers as well as representatives from university management to introduce them to the articulated framework and principles of implementation.
• Invite feedback and critique on the conceptual and theoretical deliberations as well as principles of implementation identified.

Envisioned outcomes from this second workshop component include:

• Identification of and networking with emerging researchers in the field of open education research who: (a) could function as collaborators in longer-term research work; or (b) require mentorship or supervision in future research or study programmes.
• Critical review of proposed theoretical approach and conceptual framework to be employed in OESJ research context.
• Critical review of a set of principles which can be utilised in organisational change processes aiming to further socially just open education initiatives. Venue: University of Cape Town, Centre for Innovation in Learning and Teaching

Venue: Cape Town
Contact details: Cheryl Hodgkinson-Williams, +27 21 650 3478

The chairs for Theme 2 - Education for a Sustainable Society - would like to invite researchers who like to meet Swedish and South African colleagues interested in issues related to education. This is an informal meeting, which will be held at University of the Western Cape, that could perhaps be expressed as “academic speed dating”! During the session, where some small drinks and snacks will be offered, we will simply accommodate the possibility for researcher to come together and discuss research matters and possible collaborations.

Venue: University of the Western Cape, EMS building
Contact details:
Professor Per Assmo, per.assmo@hv.se
Professor Jose Frantz, jfrantz@uwc.ac.za