4 | News
3 May 2021
Intervarsity News University of Cape Town (UCT) On 18 April, a fire started at the base of Table Mountain and quickly spread to surrounding areas. The fire, which damaged the Rhodes Memorial Restaurant and surrounding areas, spread towards UCT, forcing students in campus residences to evacuate. All residence students were moved to off-campus locations and hostels and hotels in Cape Town have offered these students temporary housing and food. Damage to the UCT campus includes the Pearson, Smuts and Fuller halls, as well as the JW Jagger Library, which is known to house important and irreplaceable historical documents and texts. Schemes like Millennium Fundraising and the United Feeding Scheme have offered support to displaced students by providing sanitary products, food and water. The UCT SRC has also been providing people with resources for donation and spreading information and banking details of companies and charities that have been willing to assist the university and displaced students. University of Johannesburg (UJ) UJ has received a donation of R110 million for the advancement of the fourth Industrial Revolution in underprivileged communities. The origin of the project and the donation came from the non-profit organisation, Growing Up Africa (GUA), which works a researchbased development and design programme which is meant to build and
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Brooklyn SAPS weighs in on cell phone robberies
equip strong education structures for less fortunate communities. The founder and Chief Executive of GUA, Deborah Terhune, started the project. According to the university website, the donation has funded the construction of an Education Campus Project in Devland, Soweto, South of Johannesburg. This campus will be used to establish a centre to advance science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics for the benefit of youth of the community and ultimately for improvement of ecological, social and economic sustainability. University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) South Africa’s Dr Sibongile Khumalo has been awarded an honorary doctorate in music from Wits University. The doctorate was conferred on 21 April and was accepted in a virtual graduation by her daughter, Ayanda Khumalo. The singer passed away on 21 January 2021, before she was able to receive the award, but not before she was informed that she was being honoured with the award. North-West University (NWU) With the COVID-19 pandemic having placed an immeasurable strain on South Africa’s health services and medical professionals, NWU has stated that these events have “dramatically strengthened” the institution’s case for a medical school in the North West. This
comes months after Nelson Mandela University launched a medical school in the Eastern Cape. Plans to establish a medical school at NWU were mooted in 2006, but the plan began taking serious shape in 2017. The NWU Council Chairperson, Dr Bismark Tyobeka, remarked that the NWU Medical School would address the needs of a demand in students, as well as for the greater public. This saw the establishment of the NWU Medical School Task Team, led by Dr Tyobeka and including the dean of NWU’s Faculty of Health Sciences, Prof. Awie Kotzé, as well as the institution’s Principal and Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Dan Kgwadi, which will investigate the case for a medical school. Once the project is greenlit by the relevant authorities, this will pave the way for the 11th university medical school in South Africa. Compiled by Katherine Weber and Tshepang Moji
vCampus
Nostalgia: Flashback to student news in 1946
Nokwanda Kubheka
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atfield and Hillcrest have become an easy spot for criminals to make a quick buck by snatching phones from unsuspecting students. According to Sergeant Webster Scheepers from Brooklyn SAPS, there has been an increase in cell phone robberies in their policing area. In most cell phone robberies, the victims were walking or standing with either their cellphones in their hands or on a phone call when it was grabbed from them. Sgt. Scheepers says reports show that an unknown man usually comes from behind, grabs the cellphone and runs towards a getaway vehicle that is waiting nearby and the vehicle speeds off. Although street robberies can be identified as a crime of opportunity and occur within a few seconds, Sgt. Scheepers said students that are listening to music, texting or generally using their phones in public are a prime target for criminals. You can protect yourself and your cellphone by: • Treating your cell phone the way you treat cash; do not flash it around in public; • Walking in groups, especially at night; • Using well-lit and relatively busy roads; • Changing your route if you think that someone is following you, and turning into an open business premises for help to contact the police; and • refraining from talking to unknown people and not allowing yourself to get distracted by people who are selling items on the street. Sgt. Scheepers also encouraged students to trust their instincts and not to allow technology to take away their focus from what is going on around them. Brooklyn SAPS can be reached at 012 366 1700.
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DBY has covered student news for 83 years, but the type of news that students follow has evolved over generations at UP. This edition’s Campus Nostalgia offers some insight into the type of news student journalists covered, and the stories students were interested in reading in 1946, not long after the newspaper reopened after a four-year closure due to a paper shortage in World War 2. In a 1946 issue of PDBY (then known as Die Perdeby) published on 27 March, a student recounts a bus breakdown on a drama trip to Railway Institute Hall in Witbank. The student explains that the bus that the students was travelling in came to a grinding halt, and the group were stranded. The recollection is vivid, as the student fearfully recounts how plumes of smoke and steam evaporated from the bus engine, and the students mentions that the accident was accredited to the bus being overcrowded. There named mention that the jerk of the breakdown caused a student names Jeanne’s violin to fall and break, with “only Wouter being able to calm her down”. Wouter’s comment of “don’t sissy the woman” is described as having irritated the sentiments of female students on the bus. The two hour delay caused by the accident is described as dampening the “the spontaneous zest for life” of students on the bus. It is mentioned that another bus from Witbank was sent to pick up the students who expressed dissatisfaction at having to wait it out in the hot, arid weather. A neighbouring yard near the bus provided a source of water for students to cool off while they waited. Following the arrival of the new bus, the students travelled between Bronkhorstspruit (the site of the breakdown) and Witbank between 5am (the time they started their journey) and 6:45am (when they arrived at Railway Institute Hall). The student account states that “everyone was quiet now and whoever was not sitting and reading was lying asleep on his or her partner’s lap”. Once it was time to prepare for the competition, it is mentioned that the female students started to iron their Voortrekker dresses, with the only switch point for the iron being in the men’s dressing room. Before the start of their performance, students were treated to pies and fruit for dinner. The article also mentions that the students’ acting instructor, Uncle Jerry, provided some surprisingly positive critique by stating, “if you are not going to perform worse than tonight, our tour is a huge success.” It is concluded that the students came runner up in the drama competition. The news story ends with the student describing his and another man’s attempt to flirt with women at the competition, but says that they were too tired to really pick up any dates. Compiled by: Susanna Anbu
