Join the Future at CGS

College of College of Graduate Studies

Prof Lindiwe Zungu, Executive Dean: College of Graduate Studies

As Unisa strives to define the tomorrows of its students by shaping their futures in the service of humanity, the College of Graduate Studies (CGS) further extends an invitation to postgraduate diploma, honours, master’s and doctoral students to Join the Future by becoming members of a research-focused college and users of a resourceful student-centred website.

"We are pleased and excited to announce the newly designed website after months of hard work and dedication from the CGS and Department of Institutional Advancement team," acclaimed Doctor Mlambo of the CGS Marketing Unit. The primary goal during the redesign process was to create a more valuable, user-centric and responsive resource across all digital devices. "As the CGS, we want to make it easier for our postgraduate students from the seven Unisa colleges to locate valuable information about our services. We aspire to be unique and this website gives us that sense of uniqueness," said Professor Lindiwe Zungu, Executive Dean of CGS.

Growing the CGS footprint

The college has multi-, inter- and transdisciplinary research at the core of its activities, with a concentration on the studies, research support and research resources for postgraduate students. CGS prides itself on a wide range of national and international networks through their academic staff. The college is home to the South African Research Chair in Social Policy, led by the internationally-acclaimed Professor Jimmy Adesina, and the UNESCO-Unisa Africa Chair in Nanosciences and Nanotechnology, led by the prolific multi-award-winning Professor Malik Maaza. CGS is also home to the Ethiopia Regional Centre under the leadership of Dr Tsige Aberra.

CCG’s unique position of working across all the colleges at postgraduate level is well situated to cascade some of the critical projects of transformation in the university and impact all postgraduate students, who mostly do research, as well as the academics who drive high-impact research in the respective colleges. Cognisant of the fact that the university has entered a season of developing and owning new knowledges epistemologies centred on Africa, the CGS’s proposal is to forge a strategic partnership with the Department of Leadership and Transformation on scholarship transformation and conjointly work toward leading the development, critiquing and implementation of a new pool of Africa-centred epistemologies.

CGS is hoping to reach and support more postgraduate students and staff with the newly designed website, and, furthermore, to garner new students and grow the college footprint throughout South Africa, the African continent and the rest of the world.

A website designed for postgraduate studies

Doctor Mlambo, College of Graduate Studies Marketing Unit

On the CGS website you can access the School of Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Studies (SIRGS) - led by seasoned scholar Professor Patrick Ngulube - which supports postgraduate students in their research journey to complete their degrees. SIRGS offers research training workshops that are interdisciplinary in nature and useful to all postgraduate students from all Unisa colleges.

These workshops aim to give postgraduate students an introduction to the research process. The objectives of these training workshops are to: introduce students to the Unisa research environment and research ethics; to introduce students to academic writing skills; to provide information about the research processes, the functions and components of the research proposal. Additionally, to introduce students to similarity checking software like Turnitin; acquaint students with various referencing styles used in research; to develop an understanding of the role of theory in research; and to familiarise students with various research methodologies.

The website offers an easy access to postgraduate bursaries call for applications and notifications; important information on postgraduate studies; and research support programmes.

"We believe these initiatives are a gateway to understanding the culture and ethos of Unisa. The CGS website and social media platforms will offer students a glimpse and the kind of ideas and solutions the institution is able to generate when offering services that defines who we are, what we believe in and where we are going. When we say Join the Future for lifelong learning, we want to partner with students today and beyond in the shaping of their future," said Zungu.

Do you want to Join the Future? Follow the link.

For more on CGS research activities, you can follow us on the following social media platforms: