The national debate on community engagement in South African higher education: an interpretation

1. The national debate on community engagement in South African higher education: an interpretation Magda Fourie Vice-rector: Teaching 3 April 2008

2. Overview of presentation • National policy framework • Historical backdrop, in particular CHESP • Community Engagement in Higher Education Conference • Critical issues identified • What does this signify for Stellenbosch University?

3. National policy framework • White Paper on Higher Education (1997): identifies community engagement as integral and core part of higher education in SA • Specific reference to the role community engagement can play in transforming higher education • HEIs should demonstrate social responsibility… and their commitment to the common good by making available expertise and infrastructure for community service programmes

4. National policy framework (cont) • National Plan for Higher Education (2001): enhancing of responsiveness to regional and national needs, for academic programmes, research and community service

5. National policy framework (cont) • HEQC identified knowledge based community service as one of the three areas (together with teaching and learning, and research) for quality assurance of higher education • Criteria for Institutional Audits include criteria on both service-learning and community engagement • Criteria for Programme Accreditation include minimum requirements for service-learning

6. Historical backdrop • Examples of different forms of community engagement activities at many HEIs: voluntarism, internships, experiential education, service-learning, community outreach, research and development projects for communities or industry • Not necessarily planned and co-ordinated

7. Historical backdrop (cont): • JET Education Services: - since 1997 active in research and development to advance CE - survey of community service in SA HE in 1997/8 – two publications - Community-Higher Education-Service Partnerships (CHESP) initiative launched in 1999

8. Historical backdrop (cont): CHESP: • To support development of pilot programmes that explore potential of CE as integral part of core academic functions of HEIs • To monitor and evaluate these programmes • To use data generated to inform HE policy and practice

9. Historical backdrop (cont): • At national level several seminars, workshops, capacity building sessions by CHESP, HEQC and DOE • Development of Good Practice Guide for Service-learning • Increasing international contacts and exposure • At institutional level policy and strategy development, resource allocation, integration into academic programmes through service-learning

10. Conference on Community Engagement in Higher Education • Hosted by CHE/HEQC and JET/CHESP in September 2006 • Largest and most important conference on this topic in SA • More than 200 delegates • Representatives from all public HEIs in SA and numerous others • Speakers included Minister of Education, Premier of WC, vice-chancellors, and scholars from SA and abroad

11. Critical issues • Conceptualisation • Strategic considerations • Planning and operational challenges • Partnerships • Building a scholarship of CE

12. Conceptualisation • Examples: broad social frame of reference for engagement through Mode 2 knowledge (Gibbons), engagement as form of scholarship (Fourie), engagement as mechanism to make university a knowledge-based instrument of social equity (De la Garza)

13. Conceptualisation (cont) • National level (enabling framework) - Setting broad parameters for CE - Place of community engagement in social development agenda • Institutional level (context-specific) - Establishing a relationship between CE and two other core functions - Possible models for community engagement

14. Strategic considerations • National level: - What additional policy, funding, monitoring and reporting levers are necessary to embed CE in HE? - How to embed/reconcile CE with policy implementation already under way?

15. Strategic considerations (cont) • Institutional level: - Governance and leadership - Institutional vision/mission - Roles of different stakeholders - Community voice

16. Planning and operational challenges - Resource allocation - Quality assurance and evaluation - Performance management - Staff incentives and development - Risk management - Organisation of research - Student learning

17. Partnerships • Shared vision • Clarification of roles and expectations • Power relations • Reciprocity and mutual benefits • Regional consortia

18. A scholarship of CE (theoretical work) • What are the bodies of knowledge that could inform CE? • What are the new epistemologies for establishing CE as a field of knowledge? • What are the new pedagogies for teaching and learning to give effect to CE? • What are the new research methodologies needed to give substance to CE?

19. What does this signify for Stellenbosch University? • Have we clearly conceptualised community interaction at SU? • Who are our communities? • What is our approach to community interaction: - the silo model - the intersecting model - the infusion (cross-cutting) model ?

23. Is community interaction at SU about realising a Pedagogy of Hope?

24. Thank you!