UNISA – Virtual Canuck

Last summer I was asked to join a “quality audit” team that had been created by the Commonwealth of Learning and contracted by the University of South Africa (UNISA) to do a Trail Audit. This process involved a trip to London and this month a trip to Petoria, SA. In this post I talk about UNISA, about my experiences (to which I am not accustomed) in business class and a brief encounter with the South African medial system.

The University of South Africa

The first thing you might notice from the picture below and when driving into Petoria from Johannesburg airport, is the imposing campus of the UNISA. This is the main campus in Petoria which is augmented by a network of regional offices and campuses spread throughout the country. Unisa boast over 340,000 students making it the largest university in the Southern hemisphere. All of the undergraduates work from home, businesses or regional offices. Thus, the campus houses faculty, a huge printing press, library and offices for graduate students – of which there are also thousands.

The University will be audited in 2020 by the Council on Higher Education (CHE) which is the accreditation and regularity agency of the Government of South Africa. In preparation for this Quality audit, the University contracted with COL to undertake a pre-trial quality audit.

UNISA Choir entertains

Unisa was the first university in South Africa from which all of the other universities spun off. Unisa was established by the Brits in 1873 after the University of London model in which no teaching is does, but they set curriculum and examine students who learn however they can. Nelson Mandela is their most famous grad. In 1947 the University started creating print packages, thus becoming the worlds’ first distance eduction institution. They have begun huge (34% of all postsecondary students in South Africa) and largest university in Africa. They are struggling to move from an Open and Distance Learning (ODL) university to an Open and Distance Electronic Learning (ODeL) university – with a zillion challenges. One of which is figuring out if they should abandon their printing presses (largest print shop in the southern hemisphere). The print shop has a warehouse sized “Vault” in which they guard the final exams, since they are terrified of ”leaks” , by which Mafia types obtain final exams and sell them a few days before the exams are written – all across the country on the same exam days. They have testing centres in Johannesburg that sit 2,000 students, at a time, 3 sessions a day. This places them – like most higher education institutions very vulnerable to academic fraud.

Our 6 person team was led by the President of COL and consisted of Professors from South Africa, Tanzania, India, Mauritius and Canada. and with interest in quality standards, technology, student support, African universities and African Open Universities. During the week of our visit we interviewed about 300 people – from President to many students, on main campus and 5 regional centres. The idea of hiring a group of outsiders to audit a whole Universities quality standards just doesn’t happen in Canada, so I really didn’t know what to expect. A really striking feature of the project was the posters, banners, meals, banquets and pomp and circumstances about this audit and our visit . Quite surprising to see notes on our arrival displayed all over the campuses we visited.

Gala Goodbye banquet with Jazz Quartet

The University (and the 5 particular programs that we selected for detailed review) undertook a self-evaluation (300 + pages of text) before our arrival. On the final afternoon we provided our initial findings to a cast of a few hundred. This presentation focused on areas lsuch as quality assurance measures, teaching and learning (my area), technology used, research capability etc. etc. Our report seemed to be well received – but how much credibility can you give to a self evaluation and 5 day visit by group of outsiders? Now we go home and pour through the notes from 2 scribes hired to record everything and then create (and have them verify) a final report. The report will have both commendations (what we impressed by) and recommendations (suggestions for improvement).

Adventures in Business Class.

Last March I had Speaking trip to South Africa as an invited keynote speaker at UNISA’s annual research week. Thus, I was well aware of the challenges of 23 hours in the air and another 10 so getting to, and switching airports. Thus, the offer to repeat the journey this month- but in business class was a real incentive. I got to savour the service on three different airlines (Westjet, KLM and Virgin Air). The trip from Edmonton in December involves travelling through two nights. Of course they treat business class passengers with a lot more choice and comfort than I’m used to in coach. I relaxed and actually fell asleep in 3 types of “sleeping pods”. The biggest surprise was opening the duffle bag at my seat on Virgin Air, thinking it would be the too small blanket that I would wrestle myself under. But no! It was a pair of flannel pyjamas – Like I am going to get into pyjamas and walk down the aisle – NOT!

The food was great – they even had a standup bar with snacks on the 747! But I didn’t do much but read, NOT drink too much, watch a couple of good movies and then sleep! I arrived at 11:00 PM Sunday and we had our first meeting at 7:30 AM the next day, so I didn’t have any time for jet lag. Getting a good sleep on the airplane seems to have almost eliminated jet lag – at least on this trip for me!

carbon footprint

Now getting to the hard part – the carbon footprint. You may have read the data that the extra carbon cost of business class and I don’t doubt it is true. So I have little excuse, except to hope that our recommendations will impact the lives of 340,000 students at UNISA. And that that will make a difference.

My Encounter with South Africa and It’s Health Care System

South Africa is (at least by Canadian standards) a pretty scary place. Very visible poverty and unemployment are clearly visible. The protection industry is thriving guards (mostly unarmed), barbed wire, police cars and groups of people in the streets are everywhere. Alongside the poverty are miles of gated and fenced (and I mean big fences) communities. Thus there are many living in pretty severe poverty, while the evolving middle class (both whites and blacks) lives at least partially in a culture of fear. The scary irony is that the country (with its opportunities!) attracts thousands of economic refugees daily from other African countries.

I also had an adventure with the South African medical system. Two days after my arrival I started getting a pain in my lower leg, this continued into a purple rash that kept growing. I figured I better get it checked in case it was flesh eating disease or something worse! UNISA staff took me to the University Health clinic where the nurse suggested I should see a doctor. The clinic referred me to a hospital, but my hosts figured it would be too long of a wait so we travelled way into the burbs to a health clinic where I had an appointment with two doctors. It was weird entering the strip mall clinic (open 24 hours a day) and seeing signs in both Africans and English and staff of all races – expect the doctors that I saw were both white.

They pretty quickly diagnosed the rash as shingles, but they also did all kinds of pressing and pushing, blood test, heart stuff etc. I walked out with 3 prescriptions and a bill for about $100 Canadian total. Ironically, I had had a shingles c=vaccine four years ago, but I have come understand the chicken pox/shingles virus (they are the same critter) can erupt at any time from those who have chicken pox in their lifetime. I didn’t really understand the contagion issue with shingles at the time and so thought it best to cancel my one-day safari trip to see the lions. Fortunately it rained anyways, but we were told that when it rains when visitors come, it is a very good omen!

So South Africa seems to have a great health care system – IF you have money. This clinic was nearby the gated community where the black vice president who was hosting us lived, so we dropped him off at his home. He had a card to open the gate and let us drive into his house, but when we went to leave, the guards wouldn’t let me and the black driver out!! We had to drive back to the VP’s house and get him to verify that we hadn’t ransacked his house.

My flight home was uneventful- the best kind.

I hope you have enjoyed this brief chronicle of the trip.

This is my second and final post on my winter-buster visit to Open Universidat Aberta in Portugal and my visit last week to the University of South Africa (UniSA).

Although I have been to South Africa before I had never had the opportunity to visit the world’s oldest distance education university! Unisa is HUGE – I heard varying numbers ranging from 375,000 to 450,000 students. The variations relate in part deciding if a student should be counted if they take a term off, can’t afford tuition or are otherwise not currently enrolled in a course, though still actively enrolled in a program of studies. In any case, courses with 15-20,000 concurrent students are not unknown. Given my experience of distance education systems two whole order of magnitudes smaller than those Unisa deals with made me wonder if I was the right expert to be addressing these distance education colleagues.

Unisa has numerous student centres around the country but the flagship reigns like a giant space ship on the hill as you enter the capital city of Petoria. It is a huge building and begs the question of who is actually there if the students are all at a distance. I came to understand that UNISA is also major provider of Masters and especially PhD students, many (or most) of whom are resident at Unisa. And in addition the number of staff to develop, support and deliver courses on this scale, also requires huge number of office spaces.

Each year Unisa organizes a research week in which they invite one or more keynote speakers to kick of the week and then each of the faculties is expected to convene a series of presentations, roundtables, keynotes and panel sessions focused on research related to the theme, from their discipline perspective. This was the first time that the research week had focused on Open and Distance Learning (ODL) research itself. I find that this lack of focus and energy on what makes distance education unique a bit puzzling. However, I realize that Unisa like too many other distance education institutions hires faculty and is judged, not by the research nor the quality of their ODL programming, but by the research in traditional disciplines – similar to campus based universities. Thus myself, my good friend and co-author Olaf Zawacki-Ricter from Germany and a new friend Christine Ofulue from Nigeria Open University were invited as keynotes.

They certainly put us to work. Besides the opening keynote and panel discussion, Olaf and I did two half day workshops on research theory and techniques, I did two other keynotes at the Business and Graduate Studies Colleges and 3 more panel discussions. All and all it was a bit much, but on the plus side, we were treated royally with many a fine restaurant meal and opportunity to socialize with colleagues.

At the research Awards Gala with Colleagues

The university also arranged a half-day visit to Johannesburg where we visited the infamous Fort Jail where both Nelson Mandala and Mahatma Gandhi had been imprisoned. The prison tour graphically illustrated the almost unbelievable cruelty inflicted by both white and black wardens on the prisoners. But even more shocking was the differential treatment down to food rationing, showering and actual square sleeping space given to the highly segregated prison blocks. Black prisoners ate their extremely meager food from unwashed plates, sitting on the bare concrete only feet away from open and often overflowing latrines. Of course some of the prisoners were convicted of theft and other crimes but many were being held (up to 180 days without charge or trial) for political activities or even for being outside an area to which you were constrained by their pass book.

This sobering tour was relieved by a quick tour of the South African Supreme Court, building – a building constructed from bricks of the old cell blocks on the same Jail site. The Court building is rich in symbolism, such as the building pillars resembling a tree under which the traditional chief would meet with citizens to dispense justice. The courtroom itself was slightly sunk into the ground and very narrow windows on the side that allowed judges to see only the legs from the knee down of pedestrians walking between buildings. This view encouraged judges, lawyers and visitors to acknowledge persons but not to be able to judge them based upon their gender, their nationality, their religion or their cultural or tribal background.

Windows at the Supreme Court, walls from bricks of old cell blocks

We then drove through Johannesburg – the only major city in the world not established on a river, lake or sea-coast. The city was established to serve the gold and later coal and diamond mines in the area. I knew the City had a mining history, but I didn’t realize the city was actually on the mines, with great piles of slag visible as we drove through the suburbs. Our tour guide even talked of illegal mining still going on within the city and the near calamity of a major natural gas line being disturbed by blasting from illegal miners within the city limits.

Our tour ended with a visit to the Apartheid Museum. Though of course I am old enough to remember reading newspaper accounts of the Soweto uprisings, the Sharpville Massacre, the murder of Steve Biko, Nelsons Manadal’s release from prison and other headlines, I never really understand the all encompassing pervasiveness of the attempt to rule a country based on racial origins. I also came to understand the forces of industrialization on under educated whites and the fear that drove them to try to maintain their excusive privilege – much as the Trump supporters today struggle to regain hegemony and long lost wealth and influence. On the plane home I read a book about a police spy and his successful penetration of white anti-apartheid organizations both internally and outside South Africa. I had no idea of the relentless war conducted by the South African police to murder and imprison activists, both black and white, within and outside of the country.

I also had time to consider the strategic efforts of Unisa to ‘Africanize’ the curriculum. During one of the panel sessions, one young, white, female academic asked the panel members if Africanization of the curriculum meant that it had to be taught by black Africans. The response from the panelists was unclear. However noting the complete absence of any but black Africans in executive positions and a few private conversations makes me realize that the wounds of colonialism and racism will take a very long time to heal.