Sharing knowledge, building networks

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Public Relations students were left inspired after a recent event co-hosted by The Public Relations Programme and The Public Relations Institute of South Africa.

The student engagement event, which was held at the Cape Town Hotel School, was aimed at enhancing relationships with alumni and creating dialogue through the theme Building a supportive alumni network.

The event was a second-year student practical.

The four alumni speakers represented, among others, the international non-profit sector, radio and online management. The alumni shared stories about their career paths and milestones, industry expectations and what motivated them to achieve.

The Advancement Department’s Valerie Deelman spoke about the importance of nurturing partnerships with alumni, corporates, government, trusts, foundations and other supporters to help advance teaching and learning at CPUT.

Deidre Porthen, senior lecturer in the Public Relations Programme, thanked the alumni for availing themselves and for motivating the students.

“The session was a success and plans are to make this an annual event.”

Accounting student opens Cape’s first township pharmacy

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Applying the knowledge obtained from class, a second-year Accounting student, has created a business opportunity out of a community problem.

After noticing how difficult it is for residents in disadvantaged areas such as Khayelitsha and Joe Slovo to access medicine, Thembekile Mahintsho recently opened Mangethe’s Medi Store, the first and only pharmacy in Joe Slovo.

With motivation from this lecturers, including Andre van den Bergh, Widaad Martin and Anthony Ezeonwuka, Thembekile started the pharmacy in June using savings from his study loan.

“Accounting teaches us to think outside the box; the knowledge gained from CPUT is now applied to solve real-life problems,” says the tenacious 22-year old. “CPUT has played a huge role in preparing for this life as an entrepreneur.”

Thembekile’s pharmacy has been mentioned in over ten newspapers. He sells only over the counter drugs and not prescribed medicine.

He adds that he aims to grow the business but first he wants to make it viable.

His range of products on sale includes African traditional medicines because he says that he understands his customers’ needs and always strive to address them.

What gives him a competitive edge over the large supermarkets is that he sells his products cheaper and only charges his customers an additional R10 for delivering their medicines at their homes. He even sells on credit but does not add interest to the prices.

Thembekile adds that when the news about his pharmacy first broke, Western Cape Health MEC, Dr Nomafrench Mbombo, got hold of him and promised that her office will facilitate for him to be awarded a pharmacy license.

His now awaiting the pharmacy council to visit his store and inspect whether it can be considered for licensing.

“The Cipla Foundation has been sponsoring me with their products, Rabie Property Group Pty Ltd at Century City funded me with R10 000 and the NYDA has approved my funding application which will see them funding me with a brand new motorbike, stock and a cash register machine.

PIONEER: Thembekile Mahintso

Working across disciplines to help learners

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Education and Business students recently banded together to work on a literacy project aimed at primary school children.

Learners from the Belhar Pentech Community Care organisation travelled to CPUT’s Wellington Campus for a day of workshops geared around language and literacy.

The five students from the Faculty of Education joined three Business Management students plus a visiting student from Belgium to explore creative ways to engage the 26 learners who ranged from Grade 3 to 6.

Once the students had shown the learners around the Wellington campus they started with icebreakers and then divided the children into groups, rotating them around various stations.

Third year Education student Johan Pienaar was responsible for the debating and critical thinking station where learners were taught how to argue a point and critically question what is being said. He initially thought they would be dealing with older children so quickly had to adjust his methods: “The learners got distracted easily so in future I would look to incorporate more visual and practical resources to retain their attention,” said Pienaar.

Senior lecturer in the Department of English in the Faculty of Education Dr Hanlie Dippenaar said the purpose of the workshop was to give the students a chance to work with learners in an informal setting and to work across disciplines.

“This was a pilot project which might be developed into a longitudinal project. It could be done as a weekend camp in future,” said Dippenaar.

NGO Help2Read, which often partners with the Wellington Campus on Community Projects and Service-Learning, donated a book to each of the learners, who also received stationery from the Community Engagement Unit, which helped to plan the project.

“We would like to thank the CE Unit for the opportunity and we would be interested in doing similar projects that could include more students,” said Dippenaar.

Written by Theresa Smith

Research stars shine at BTech Conference

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Students in the Faculty of Business and Management Sciences who are outstanding research presenters won cash prizes during this year’s BTech Conference.

The faculty held the conference on the District Six Campus recently under the theme, driving economic development and empowerment through research and innovation.

The faculty’s Dean, Prof Paul Green, said the conference was the initiative and drive of acting Assistant Dean: Research & Innovation, Prof Chux Iwu.

Green added that the purpose of a conference of this nature was developmental, as well as to stimulate and provoke critical thinking and provide for the extension of learning.

“It is the basis of an academic or anyone pursuing the route of academia,” he said.

He argued that South Africa was calling out for action, particularly in the area of economic development so much that some even argue that economic reform should be done radically.

The prizes for individual presentations were R5 000 for the winner, R3 000 2nd prize and Special commendation R750, while for group presentations the prizes were R8 000 for the winners, 2nd R5 000 and  Special Commendation R1 000.

Prizes for the individual presenters were awarded as follows:

Commendation prizes went to the Retail Business Management, Cost and Management Accounting, Financial Management and Tourism Management departments;

The runner-up went to Internal Auditing Department and the winner was the Sport Management Department.

For the presenting groups Commendation Awards were given to HR Management, Business and Information Administration and Hospitality Management departments. The Entrepreneurship and Marketing departments were awarded runners-up and winners, respectively.

Sibusiso Zondi, of Emerald Group Publishing, which was one of the conference sponsors, said 37 CPUT authors are published through Emerald and that the group offers annual research funding awards.

Enabling environmental health practitioners

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The Environmental Health programme recently said goodbye to the last third year students for the course in its current format.

On the last day of their exams, as the programme came to a close, the staff threw the 35 students a small party.

In addition to the surprise party the students also received their Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA) certificates. [The HPCSA is a statutory body which aims to protect the public by investigating unethical conduct by qualified practitioners and regulating the training of Environmental Health Practitioners (EHPs), medical Doctors and other health professionals.]

Acting Head of Programme: Environmental Health Michael Agenbag said it made the day very special because the certificates would enable the students to register for community service.

“To illustrate the importance of these certificates and their implication for our students, our cohort of the 2015 Environmental Health students who are currently doing their BTech could not get placement for their compulsory Community Service this year at the Cape Winelands District Municipality because they did not have their HPCSA student registration certificates,” said Agenbag.

Community Service is not a requirement to graduate, but it is expected of EHPs to give back to the country. “The authorities determine where the biggest needs are, in particular in underserviced areas where the country struggles to retain health professionals,” explained Agenbag.

The current cohort of 1st and 2nd year Environmental Health students at CPUT has been studying towards a four year professional degree known as Bachelor of Environmental Health since the start of 2017.

“This degree will now become the minimum requirement for students and qualified Environmental Health Practitioners to register with HPCSA as EHPs to work within the scope of the profession,” explained Agenbag.

The new professional degree students would also have to register as student EHPs to do community service. Though the Professional Board for Environmental Health within the HPCSA has asked that students handle their own registration Agenbag says CPUT’s Environmental Health programme has decided to step in to help with administrative arrangements.

Written by Theresa Smith

Research provides Food for Thought

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The Cape Town Hotel School’s recent BTech Conference served a mixed bag of research topics, leaving attendees with much food for thought.

A total of 20 presentations were covered and students were given 10 minutes to present their work.

The event, held at the Southern Sun Waterfront, was attended by several industry representatives, many of whom indicated that they were impressed with the calibre of student and the presentations.

The research topics included: The impact of the VAT increase on restaurant operations in Cape Town, The impact of drought on the ultra-luxury hotel segment in the V&A Waterfront and Diversification of ethnicity beliefs within the working environment.

Senior lecturer Dr Tshinakaho Nyathela said the conference is an annual event and was first held in 2017.

“The main aim is to showcase what we do as the hospitality department and also showcase to the industry and departments the kind of research that our students do as well as the research we do as a department. I was very impressed with the presentations, our students went all out.”

She said the conference was also an opportunity to identify potential candidates for Master’s study.

Student Andisile Mbolompo said the conference was a great learning experience and helped to connect students with industry role players

Starting a foundation of hope

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Student organisation The Hope Foundation donated clothes to Khayelitsha residents who lost their homes in a recent fire.

Sparked by a news report that more than 1 300 people had been left homeless after hundreds of shacks were destroyed in a blaze, The Hope Foundation teamed up with student organisation Nika Foundation to help the people in need, despite all the students being busy with November exams.

“The organisations collected 70 bags of clothes and a few bags of food from some of the CPUT residences. This was done by organisation members and volunteers by way of a door to door collection,” explained The Hope Foundation co-founder, second year Accounting student, Ntombozuko Bota.

She said they laundered and sorted all the clothes at night in a very short time frame, leading to some sleepless nights for volunteers. “It was a lot of work to do but we managed as the aim was to give within a reasonable timeframe, while people are still in need,” said Ntombozuko.

The Hope Foundation was founded in 2017 by Ntombozuko, Maphelo Tshapile and Sinethemba Mabovu and it has grown to include not only CPUT students.

“We started by looking for sponsors to help children whose families were affected by the fire in Philippi at the beginning of this year. We then donated school shoes to an orphanage in the Strand and this donation to the people of Khayelitsha is our third project.

“Our projects are dependent on donors and sponsors and we are currently looking for sponsors and donors to help us help the children of an orphanage with Christmas clothes and school uniforms for January. Our mission is to be the voice of the disadvantaged, to restore hope to hopeless souls,” said Ntombozuko.

She pointed out the most recent collection for Khayelitsha residents was a huge success only because of the students who opened their hearts to donate and the volunteers who put a lot of effort into the project.

Written by Theresa Smith

Seminar tackles Translanguaging

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Switching between two languages when teaching provides for the exploitation of all the linguistic repertoires of pupils in assessment for learning tasks rather than only taking their proficiency in the dominant language into account.

This is the view Prof Piet Van Avermaet, a visiting academic from Ghent University, Belgium, shared with the audience attending the Seminar on Translanguaging as a pedagogical resource.

The Seminar was hosted recently by the Faculty of Business and Management Sciences on the Granger Bay Campus.  The faculty’s language co-ordinator, Dr Sithembele Marawu invited Van Avermaet to address the seminar.

Presenting his lecture under the title, Translanguaging as a pedagogical resource. Go beyond binaries, he said: “Translanguaging is the process of making meaning, shaping experiences, gaining understanding and knowledge through the use of two languages”.

He added that social inequality and unequal outcomes in education were big problems not only in schools but also in higher education. Van Avermaet said language use at home is seen as the cause of this inequality; speaking the home language is seen as hindering children’s academic development.

“Move beyond the binaries and towards a new approach to learning that integrates translanguaging and learning,” enthused Avermaet.

He argued that when learning and evaluating are seen as inseparable, the concept of assessment for learning can be connected seamlessly to the concept of functional multilingual learning.

“Both call for a learning environment that allows frequent interaction between the pupils and allow for the exploitation of all the linguistic repertoires of pupils in assessment for learning tasks rather than only taking their proficiency in the dominant language into account.”

The art of acceptance and the absence of the grasping mind

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Written by Courtney Fowles

Intern Counselling Psychologist, District Six Campus

‘It is one of the great lies propagated by our culture that getting more and more physical and material prosperity will lead to greater and greater happiness. This is simply not true. Genuine happiness lies in not wanting. Endless wanting is such a burden to the mind. If we really wish to be happy and create happiness for those around us, our task is to clean, aerate and order our minds’ – Tenzin Palmo

“If I just lost that weight I’d feel better about myself”
“If I just gained that weight I’d feel better about myself”
“Once I get that qualification, that degree, that job I’ll be able to find peace”
“Once I am married I will feel safe and happy”
“If I just manage to get that outfit, car, or house I’ll be happy”
“If only I had not done that one thing in the past I would feel happy right now”
“If that didn’t happen to me I would be able to experience joy”
“If I got more ‘likes’ or followers things would be better”

The list goes on and the search for happiness, peace, fulfilment and joy continues. Sound familiar?
Sometimes, actually most of the time we get caught in memories of the past and musings about the future – our brains default button if you will. And when we spend time occupied in these two spaces, which do not exist in this very moment, we deny ourselves the opportunity to embrace and rest in the joy or stillness of what is right now.

Maybe how we are ‘searching’ is part of the problem. Rushing, spending, and accumulating, more and more. We seem to have buried our joy under piles of stuff that bought us some temporary pleasure or fulfilment at the time. But never seems to tick the box of eternal joy, happiness, and peace. But why, we spent so much money on that outfit, the new trend ‘must have’, appliance, watch, gadget, car, or other material thing we deemed essential to our fulfilment. And in doing this we relegate happiness to the future and we prevent ourselves from feeling content right now at this very moment! It’s the same with all the other societal expectations based on how you should look, who you should be with, what you should believe, how qualified you should be or how big your salary is. All these things are external, they rely on doing or gaining things on a superficial level of reality. They are sold to use through society’s neoliberal and capitalistic pursuits under the guise that we can purchase happiness with the latest trend or attain it by fulfilling a socially constructed expectation of what it is to be normal and happy.

A lot of us seem to think that maybe we are not good enough and by doing or attaining certain things we will finally be good enough, worthy, fulfilled, acknowledged, loved and so on. And so we attach ourselves to people, situations, beliefs, or possessions in an effort to feel good enough. You get the gist, we are constantly reaching and grasping at dreams, things, and expectations that we forget to manifest instead of dream, to appreciate the things we have and not pen happiness on the next purchase, to embrace where we are, who we are, and how we look right now in our lives rather than comparing ourselves to friends or celebrities on social media. We need to loosen the hold our expectations and desires have on us and free ourselves from this illusion.

The wisdom of Tibetan psychology tells us that the essence of Buddhism involves the absence of grasping and desire which is known as Vajrayana. So ask yourself; are you happy, content, and joyful and at peace right now?
If yes, great! I could learn a thing or two from you!
If no, that’s okay maybe the trick is not looking at attaining more externally but emptying it out a bit, clearing the layers of dirt we bought and borrowed to gratify our ego’s and looking inwards. That’s a bit scary for some of us, it can make us feel vulnerable which society often tells us is ‘weakness’. This is why we penned our joy to things we got pleasure from almost instantly in the outside world or we chose ignorance as the path of least resistance. Because these paths did not involve sifting through layers of fears, uncertainties, and doubts or feeling vulnerable. But what if the payoff of turning our search for happiness, joy, and peace inwards resulted in eternal happiness, joy, and peace. For some this is known as enlightenment. And we can start our journey towards that today, by;

Learning to let go
Let’s take a moment to look at our attachment and grasping tendencies:
Step 1: Identify my grasping
Find a quiet place to sit comfortably with a pen and paper handy. Start reviewing all the possessions and attachments you have accumulated in your life. Now see where an intense sense of ownership or possession is focused. These are tangible things but it could also be an attachment to ideas, knowledge, people, and symbols. Maybe you’re attached to attachment! Just write down what comes to mind without analysing it, put it aside and don’t read through it. You can keep doing this for a couple of days to see what comes up and to identify any pattern in your grasping tendencies. Ask yourself; Do I see the consequences of my grasping? Can I see the difficulties, suffering or conflict it causes?

Step 2: Imagine losing or giving away
Again find a relaxing spot with pen and paper and mentally go through the list of attachments you created. Now imagine losing the important ones, as if they were taken away or you had to give them away. E.g. If it’s your knowledge you lose it, your good looks they are gone. You had to catch a plane suddenly and leave it all behind, see what happens in your mind.

Step 3: Now give it away
Okay go on and give away one of the possessions you are attached to. It’s gone, see how this affects you now by noticing what happens in your mind and body. Now give away another thing, actually give it away. Keep giving until it becomes easier. Can you feeling anything liberating in this generosity?
I am not telling you to get rid of all your things; rather it is the psychological detachment from them that can be of benefit. To enjoy fully but have insight into your relationship with attachment and grasping is what we are trying to do. To see where our freedom lies. Here are some ways we can learn more about our attachments and how we can create some healthy distance from those that do not serve us;

Ways to let go of the grasping mind:
Practice acceptance
Openly and radically accepting ourselves as we are can be transformational. So notice how you talk to yourself, the attitude you have towards yourself, the judgements and criticisms you easily dish out to yourself on a daily basis. We expect ourselves to perfect which we are not and cannot expect to be. If we allow our minds to reveal themselves and to accept this without judgement and criticism we can find a sense of peace and understanding, without slipping into bad habits of negative self-talk that push away peace and understanding. So why not try making friends with your mind?

Body and breath
We seem to have become quite disconnected from our bodies. So just take a moment to check how your body is feeling at the moment, are you holding in your breath or is there some tension somewhere? Or can you notice any free and empty spaces in the body? Really focus on the sensations your body is experiencing. Once you’ve done this little body scan and checked in with yourself. Notice how you are feeling, the body sometimes tells us things we have become accustomed to silencing. Are you tired? Are you anxious? Are you content?

Mindfulness

“Some of us are war with ourselves without realising it: we repress feelings, deny the existence of unwelcome mind states and refuse to accept ourselves as we are. As a result we experience inner conflict, anxiety, depressive states and fear; we are unhappy in life and fearful of death” – Rob Nairn

We can make friends with our minds by learning to be a bit gentler with ourselves and letting go of thoughts and habits that do not serve us by allowing the mind to be still. Sounds a lot easier than it really is. Getting into it can be a slow and sometimes boring or very frustrating process because the mind is prone to constantly thinking, analysing and concentrating. Much like spotting an animal in the bush. If it is constantly moving you may struggle to see what it clearly is. But if it remains somewhat still you can observe it fully and with clarity. If we are able to get the mind to be fairly still we can experience clarity, wisdom, and compassion without having to look in all sorts of strange places.

Create awareness and focus
Develop bare-attention. This is the ability to notice the comings and goings of your mind without attaching thoughts and behaviours to it. As a movie camera would pan a scene without comment, evaluation, judgement, or interventions so can you with your mind – through observation. This also means don’t grasp or attach to mindfulness as it defeats the process.

Attitude of gratitude
Lastly, try cultivate this as a daily routine by just checking in with yourself, friend or loved one and listing just three things that you are grateful for on this day at this moment.
May you loosen the grip of the grasping mind and find peace, happiness, and joy in the art of acceptance.

 

Reference: Nairn, R. (2002). Living dreaming dying. Kairon Press: Kalk Bay.

Re-visioning the curriculum with Marketing ECP

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In an effort to create a more inclusive and responsive curriculum for their ECP students in 2019, the HoD, Mandy Jones, and the ECP lecturers in the Marketing department devoted three mornings to workshop their existing ECP curricula.

Everyone agreed that their existing curricula did not adequately or appropriately meet the educational needs of their students. Lecturers were keen to explore, new and fresh ways to bring the student to the centre of their thinking and practices in the ECP classroom. The three-day workshop series focused on a detailed exploration of who their ECP students are, an analysis of their current curricula, how to infuse their curricula with the three domains of learning, thus knowing, being and doing, and then examine how individual lessons could cater more fully to the specific needs of students.

The committed group worked energetically over the three days and participated in the many activities and discussions that sought to help them better understand how to change their existing curricula and classroom practices. The lecturers also decided to form a ECP curriculum committee to drive forward the work undertaken during the workshop and ensure implementation in 2019.