FACULTY SENIOR ACADEMIC APPOINTMENTS & PROMOTIONS

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, School of Anatomical Sciences

Dr Tanya Augustine

Dr Augustine holds a PhD from the University of the Witwatersrand (2014), and has recently completed the Postgraduate Diploma in Higher Education (PGDip HE).

Dr Augustine is highly adaptive in her pedagogical approach and seeks to build an understanding of how knowledge is acquired by diverse student populations. She has a far-reaching teaching portfolio that permits effective multidisciplinary applications. Dr Augustine has made considerable contributions to the curriculum and teaching innovations in Histology and Cell Biology. She has supervised 32 Honours students, 2 Masters and 3 PhD students to completion. She is currently supervising/cosupervising 6 Masters and 5 PhD candidates.

Dr Augustine has published 22 papers of which 19 are in international journals. She has several papers currently under review. She has established her own research laboratory for the purpose of expanding her research niche, which is within the area of tumourbiology. She has active collaborations within various Schools within WITS (Engineering, Clinical Medicine, Molecular and Cell Biology); the CSIR (Proteomics Unit); NECSA; Northumbria University, UK and strengthening collaborations with Ghent University, Belgium and George Washington University, USA.

She is the founding member of the WITS Cannabis Research Initiative, stimulating engagement between academics from various disciplines across economics, botany, cell biology and architecture, and Gauteng Provincial Government, with whom the objective is to enhance innovation and research, particularly in indigenous knowledge systems for academic and economic benefit. During the Covid-19 lockdown, Dr. Augustine served (along with two other academics in the School on the Interim Management Committee) as acting Head of School.

Dr Augustine was instrumental in attaining further University funding (top-up) for the upgrade of the dissection halls. Internally, Dr Augustine is an elected non-professorial academic representative on the Senate and University Forum, Collections Committee in the Ethics and Legislature portfolio, and the Faculty Board. Externally, she is an external examiner for the College of Medicine, UWC, UNISA and UP.

We congratulate Dr Augustine on her promotion to Associate Professor