600 graduate from Univen

THE hope that many students who graduated from the University of Venda (Univen), would become professors, lecturers and vice-chancellors of higher education institutions, was expressed by Univen council chairperson Shirley Mabusela at a graduation ceremony recently.

Mabusela said she appreciated that the students had put a lot of work into their studies.

“These qualifications should also benefit the country. The national development plan has clear goals for the country and you must contribute to the realisation of these goals,” Mabusela said.

Mabusela, who was joined by the vice-chancellor and principal of the university Prof Peter Mbati, awarded more than 600 students with the degrees that they worked hard for.

Of these 600 degrees, 11 were PhD, with some 80 masters’ degrees, and 88 honours degrees.

Addressing attendees, Mbati said the graduation proved that the students had not only given their undivided attention to their studies, but were now ready to use the skills they had acquired for the growth and development of society.

“Univen has placed a high premium on its academic performance and it is for this reason that, for the past eight years, we have invested about R1 billion in infrastructure development. We built additional lecture halls, laboratories, offices and student residences.

“We have also increased the number of academic and teaching assistants to improve on the student lecturer ratios in support of our teaching mandate,” Mbati said.

He added that in an effort to beef up security at the campus, they would soon roll out a multi-million rand upgrade of security systems with CCTV cameras and access cards for students to access offices and residences.

Mbati added that for the first time in the history of Univen, they would issue PC tablets to all registered students next year to enhance the capacity of the students to learn by access to reading and research materials from the internet.

PhD microbiology student, Grace Mavhandu, said hard work, dedication and being focused were the reasons for her success.