Page 97 - UniZulu Annual Report 2020

Economic Development and many other entities, who participate in the event itself. The Moses Kotane Institute has built a relationship with the faculty over the years with Prof. Greyling and Mrs Khomo.
• The Public Administration Department collaborates with the Department of Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation (DPME) where postgraduate students participate in their workshops together with other universities. They also work with the Mandeni Municipality on their career exhibitions and with uMfolozi TVET College on SONA discussions. The department conducted a public school orientation in Sinyabusi High School early this year and this was also done at other schools as well. The department has also collaborated with the Department of Public services and Administrations (DPSA) in hosting seminars where students and public officials from different municipalities, including academics from different institutions, were involved.
• SAB Foundation and the faculty have embarked on a seed funding programme for students who have good, viable business ideas. The students have been identified through a rigorous application process and now the funds will be disbursed accordingly once SAB Foundation trains the committee. Student protests as well as the COVID-19 pandemic has put a halt to this process. The students who were successful have submitted their invoices for payment and SAB Foundation will pay these students. Also, a second round of advertising will commence soon.
• Ithala Bank approached the University to nominate female students for the Young Innovators Webinar on 12 August 2020. Students from the University were nominated and sent through to Ithala Bank.
• EDHE has commenced with their Student Entrepreneurship Competition and Mr Mtshengu has entered students from the University.
• The Law Department is negotiating an MoU with The Association of Women judges to mentor female students who can become judge researchers later on.
• Prof. Kaseeram was involved since 2018 in drawing up an MoU with SAB to provide seed funding to student entrepreneurs. The MoU was signed in 2019. The competition kicked off at the 2019 Student Entrepreneurship Week and continued into 2020, despite the disruptions caused by COVID-19. The first competition of this nature involving student entrepreneurs was successfully concluded where six winners were awarded sums ranging from R5 000 to R15 000. The University Entrepreneurship Committee comprising staff members from Commerce, Science
and Arts were the main drivers of the competition. Late last year, UNIZULU launched the second competition and finalists were selected in November. The University has already, together with the assistance of SAB, selected six winners who will be awarded seed funding.
• In 2019, Prof. Greyling initiated contact with Charles Bolton from the Wadhwani Foundation – a philanthropic organisation whose mission is to promote entrepreneurship in all needy communities across the world. Prof. Kaseeram was instrumental in getting an MoU signed between the Wadhwani Foundation and the Vice-Chancellor of the University. Two staff members (Mr Mtshengu and Mrs April) were trained by the foundation in January 2020 in a ‘train the trainers’ programme, and now they are in a position to train other staff and students in the essentials of becoming an entrepreneur. They were earmarked to participate in more advanced programmes and also to kick off the training of student entrepreneurs, however, the lockdown restrictions prevented this from happening. Nonetheless, staff and students did participate in a few workshops hosted by the foundation between March and November.
RESEARCH AND INNOVATION
This section of the report covers the activities of the Research and Innovation Division through its various programmes. Overall, research outputs (publications) for the University have been on the rise in the past five years. Various staff members of UNIZULU and researchers have been invited to present at, lead and review key strategic initiatives for the future of HE and the broader national policy framework. Consistent growth in research publications and related subsidy income, advances in innovative projects, etc. attest to the fact that UNIZULU is on the rise. Indeed, practical research capacity development efforts, both internally sponsored and under the auspices of UCDP, as well as growth in externally-linked project awards by UNIZULU researchers, hold promise in improving UNIZULU performance.
As in previous years, the Research Office continues to capacitate postgraduate students, researchers and academic supervisors with a myriad development and training interventions that include supervision training workshops; supervised writing for publication mentorship; research design seminars and workshops; IP and technology transfer capacity development; NRF-rating applicant mentoring, etc. Evident growth in the quality and quantity of research outputs in the recent DHET Outputs Report are a reasonable cause for optimism.
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UNIVERSITY OF ZULULAND ANNUAL REPORT 2020