Page 10 - Transformation Report

The Centre for Integrated Post-School Education and Training (CIPSET) focuses on transformative educational praxis
in the field of community, adult, and worker education whereas the Chair for Youth Unemployment, Employability and
Empowerment (CYUEE) works to establish Mandela University as a leader in cutting-edge and engaged research in skills
and livelihoods. CIPSET, the CYUEE and the Faculty of Education drive the work of the TVET working group across faculties,
entities, and divisions. CIPSET is also coordinating important work on solidarity economies and food sovereignty.

The question of gender justice is an important focus of the ETP. The Transformation Office is responsible for institutional
advocacy and deals with cases related to GBV complaints, and the HIV & AIDS Research Unit also contributes to anti-GBV
research and advocacy. The CWGS, established in October 2019, works towards building an inclusive ‘gender agenda’
informed by the broader transformation project of the University towards a society that is more human and equal, with a
particular focus on unearthing African women’s intellectual histories. Through their online programmatic work throughout
2020 and 2021, including their ‘Author Fridays’ series, they have made great strides in establishing an Eastern Cape ‘gender
corridor’. Furthermore, the DSI-NRF SARChI Chair in African Feminist Imaginations, held by Prof Pumla Gqola and housed
under the Centre, was launched this year. The Chair is designed to study the creative arts (literature, visual arts, film, theatre,
dance, music), popular culture, and other expressions of African feminist energies while expanding African feminist theory
and scholarship and training future generations of African feminist scholars.

Exploring a Mandela academic posture and identity within the renamed University also falls within the ambit of the ETP. As
such, the Transdisciplinary Institute for Mandela Studies (TIMS) has been established in close collaboration with the Nelson
Mandela Foundation, which is the primary custodian of the Mandela legacy. TIMS is intended to drive the University’s
pursuit of becoming the pre-eminent academic expression of Mandela and has hosted a variety of workshops and events
over the past two years.

The ETP coordinates different working groups with members from across the University. These are the Equality Working
Group, the Universal Access Working Group, the Gender Transformation Working Group, the TVET Convergence Working
Group, the Institutional Culture Working Group, and the Food Systems Working Group. These working groups are facilitative
spaces to allow for the sharing of ideas concerning University transformation in the areas of equality, universal access,
gender, and institutional culture; thereby embedding transformative ideals across the institution. The Engagement Forum
will soon be established, and the Working Group on Decolonising the University/ Curriculum will take shape in 2022.

Working Groups/Communities of Praxes

• Institutional Culture Working Group • Food Systems Working Group

• Gender Transformation Strategy • TVET coordinating mechanism / TVET
Working Group Convergence Working Group
• Equity Working Group • GBV Forum
• Universal Access Working Group • Sewing Project Working Group
• Community Journalism Project
Working Group

ENGAGEMENT FORUM WORKING GROUP
Faculties, Entities, Divisions Decolonising the University/
CCC and Communities/ Decolonising Knowledge HOC
Stakeholders Working Group
e.g. BES (E&T Committee)

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