Greetings HERS-SA alumnae, members and friends.
The HERS-SA team has been very busy in the first months of 2011 !
Our annual Strategy Planning Workshop took place on 19 January 2011. As anticipated there were some lively and stimulating discussions. Those present from HERS-SA were Nasima Badsha, Sabie Surtee, Penny Franz and Phyllis Webb plus HERS-SA Members Karen Esler, Cora Motale, Firoza Patel, Lynne Rippenaar, Lindi Tlou and Nan Warner. We are most appreciative to the Members for giving their time and for their commitment to HERS-SA. We will be following up and investigating various suggestions and will report back to you in due course.
Following numerous requests from alumnae for more support after attendance at the ACADEMY, and also subsequent discussion at the Strategy Planning Workshop, it was decided to proceed with the holding of the HERS-SA mini-ACADEMY 2011. The programme was duly compiled and the inaugural mini-ACADEMY took place from 10-13 April 2011 with 28 delegates from 11 South African institutions plus 1 delegate from Angola. We have received mostly excellent delegate feedback on the programme content, the presenters and also the venue, the Upper Eastside Hotel in Woodstock. The programme is available on the mini-ACADEMY page on our website www.hers-sa.org.za
Work has already commenced for the HERS-SA mini-ACADEMY 2012 which will be open to ACADEMY alumnae who are passionate about improving their knowledge and skills to support their career aspirations in the higher education context. The programme will comprise interactive workshops which will allow delegates to understand the higher education environment better and to also understand themselves within this environment through personal insight workshops. The mini-ACADEMY 2012 will take place in April 2012. The confirmed dates and programme details will be announced in due course.
The HERS-SA ACADEMY 2011 will take place at the Breakwater Lodge, University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business in Cape Town from Saturday 11 to Sunday 17 September. We have made excellent progress with the programme which is now almost complete. We are very proud of the calibre of presenters and facilitators who have agreed to participate in this year’s ACADEMY as we believe this to be an endorsement of our ongoing aim of facilitating the advancement of women in higher education. You will have received the announcement and application details and they are also available on the HERS-SA website. We ask that you please circulate the information within your Faculty/Department and actively encourage women in middle to senior management to apply. This would also make them eligible as HERS-SA alum to attend mini-ACADEMIES. Thank you.
We are pleased to report that we were able to employ the services of Caz Thomas on a project to update the HERS-SA database. Started in 2003, the database is a significant resource as we are able to track the career paths of many of the women, both from within and outside South Africa, who have attended the April and Summer Institute programmes previously arranged in conjunction with HERS mid-America in the USA, the HERS-SA ACADEMIES, mini-ACADEMY and numerous workshops. We also like to feature our HERS-SA alumnae career moves on the News page of our website. So please keep us up to date with your own or colleagues’ career moves.
We welcome articles of interest which we can feature in the Articles page on our website. This could also include your own published research. Please send to penny@chec.ac.za
Don’t forget to check the Vacancy page on our website for available job opportunities at institutions with which we have an annual contract at very reasonable rates. If you think your institution would be interested in listing middle to senior vacancies on this page, please forward the relevant contact name to penny@chec.ac.za and we will follow up.
Keep in touch via our blog http://hers-sa.blogdrive.com/
As ever, go well. We are always interested in your news and feedback.
Warm regards
Penny Franz & the HERS-SA team