College of Law and Management Studies Awards Ceremony

BY: .

The College of Law and Management Studies held its year-end function on the Westville campus recently to acknowledge and recognise staff excellence.

In recognition of their contribution to the University and the College, seven staff members were presented with long service awards while three academics were honoured for distinguished contributions to research in 2012.

In his address, Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Head of College, Professor John Mubangizi, applauded the staff for their dedication towards ensuring that the College reached its milestones resulting in the total productivity units (based on articles, books, chapters and conference proceedings) increasing by 19 percent from the 2011 output. This follows an increase of 28 percent for 2011 on the 2010 output and the number of productive academics has improved by 10 percent from 2011 and by 52 percent from 2010.

‘This is a multi-purpose celebration as we celebrate scholarship in research, the hard work and dedication shown by College leadership and the many years of hard work that some of our colleagues have dedicated to UKZN. At the beginning of the year the University Executive Management Committee decided that 2013 would be designated as the “Year of the College” and that Colleges would take ownership and adopt a culture of improving throughput, academic reputation and achieving institutional success indicators. These things don’t just happen they take the hard work of academics, College leadership and the students,’ said Mubangizi.

Mubangizi also highlighted the milestones reached by each School which have contributed to the College having a successful year, this included:

•  The Graduate School of Business & Leadership being granted full membership of the Association of African Business Schools (AABS) earlier this year. This will enable the School to share common practices in management education with other business schools on the continent.

•  The School of Management, Information Technology and Governance becoming a PRME (Principles for Responsible Management Education) member school thus joining the United Nations driven pact involved in the development of current and future managers.

•  The School of Accounting Economics and Finance receiving accreditation for its accounting programmes based on the outstanding quality of their professional degrees.

•  The School of Law launching its Centre for Postgraduate Legal Studies aimed at improving postgraduate enrolments and to increase research productivity and LLB student Mr Ntokozo Qwabe securing the KZN Mandela Rhodes Scholarship.

Long Service Awards were presented to Mr Christopher Browne, Mr Mike Morum and Mr Ashwen Singh in recognition of 15 years of service at the University.

Ms Sheila Devaraj, Mr Mahomed Razak and Professor Karthy Govender received an award for 25 years of service. 

Awards of Research Excellence were presented to Professor Shannon Hoctor and Ms Nicola Whitear-Nel of the School of Law and Professor Sanjana Perusamur of the School of Management, Information Technology and Governance.

The College also used the event to wish retiring staff well for their future endeavours.

-          Thandiwe Jumo