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i. ‘to produce graduates that possess values, knowledge, attitudes and skills acquired
through thoughtfully designed and implemented formative and professional
teaching and learning programmes that engage simultaneously with disciplinary,
historical, ethical, cultural, economic and learning issues;
ii. to undertake critical social and scientific inquiry and imaginative and rigorous
scholarship – of discovery, integration, application and teaching - that serves
diverse intellectual, economic and social goals and the greatest public good;
iii. to contribute to forging a critical and democratic citizenship. Vibrant and
dynamic societies require graduates who are not just capable professionals,
but also thoughtful intellectuals and critical citizens that respect and
promote human rights;
iv. to proactively engage with our societies at the intellectual and, more generally,
cultural level. This requires universities to not just transmit knowledge to
people in the wider society, but to have a two-way engagement with the
wider society; a reflexive communication if you like;
v. to actively engage with their wider contexts and societal conditions. Our universities
must engage effectively with the economic and social challenges of our
local, national, regional, continental and global contexts; with the tasks of
economic development and the ability to compete globally; job creation
and the elimination of unemployment and poverty; the effective delivery
of social services and the threat of HIV/AIDS and other diseases’.

31. Useful contributions in Being at Home: Race, Institutional culture and Transformation at Higher
Education Institutions in South Africa (Tabensky and Matthews, 2015) highlight the
following transformation themes: the ‘idea’ (purpose) of a university; institutional culture,
transforming disciplinary communities; the instrumentalisation of universities in relation
to neo-liberal logics; tolerance and inclusion; policy; the role of leaders and the agency of
those who ‘flourish in the cracks’. Agential responsibility is distributed across the
university community. An instructive question from this book is: ‘Can we really think of
transforming our institutions without transforming the disciplinary communities to
which we belong?’ (Taylor, 2015).

VI. Transformation - Definitional framework

32. Given the preceding discussions and ideas underpinning the mission, purpose, mandates,
and transformation principles and themes, the following definitional framework for
higher education transformation is proposed:

a. Progress towards the attainment of levels of inclusion as reflected in the social
structure of the academy and its administration; governance and management

poverty; the effective delivery of social services and the threat of HIV/AIDS and other diseases. The challenges also encompass
the imperatives of equity and redress; social justice; the democratisation of state and society, the building of a culture of human
rights, creating a vibrant civil society, and promoting a culture of vigorous and critical intellectual public discourse. At the same
time, in playing its role, higher education must also be guided by and embody specific principles and values. These include: equity
and redress, quality, development, democratisation, academic freedom, institutional autonomy, effectiveness and efficiency, and
public accountability’.
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