Community Engagement
Community Engagement
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April 2023
Project Name: Animal Shelter
Project Partner: Johannesburg Zoo and City Parks
Project description
This project is based on Sustainable Development Goals number 15: Life on Land. In order to minimize biodiversity loss and stop the extinction of endangered species, humanity stands at a crucial juncture.
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March 2023
Project Name: Helen Joseph Campaign
Project Partner: UJ Community Engagement Office and Helen Joseph Hospital
Project description
The Helen Joseph Hospital campaign is the first community engagement activity of 2023. This project tackles Sustainable Development Goal 3, regarding “Good Health and Well-being”.
Community engagement highlights 2022
November 2022
Project Name: Clean Up Project
Project Partner: City of Johannesburg – Naazim Kajee
Project description
In this last activity of the year, SPMGP students were involved in a clean-up campaign. This activity took place at the recreation park opposite APK campus. This activity had as its purpose, to promote and encourage environmental awareness as attested to in the SDGs.
October 2022
Project Name: International Day of the Girl Child
Project Partner: Safe-Hub Youth Cafe
Project description
The 28th of October 2022, the 10th anniversary of the International Day of the Girl Child (IDG) was commemorated. Over the last decade governments, policymakers, and the general public has welcomed the voice of the girl child, a voice that was for often never heard or ignored. Despite this investment envelop, Yet, girls continue to confront a myriad of challenges to fulfilling their potential, which was made worse by the crises of climate change, COVID-19 and humanitarian conflict globally. Girls around the world continue to face unprecedented challenges in accessing basic education, maintaining their physical and mental wellness, and the scourge of gender-based violence.
September 2022
Project Name: Hospital Visit
Project Partner: Helen Joseph Hospital
Project description
24 students from the School of Public Management, Governance and Public Policy (SPMGP) participated in this month’s project. The project focused on Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3, which is Good Health and Well-Being. Given the challenges with the recent fire at Charlotte Maxeke Hospital, the Helen Joseph Hospital faced a large influx of patients. The SPMGP therefore decided to assist the Helen Joseph Hospital in addressing administrative backlogs. Moreover, the proximity of the Helen Joseph Hospital to UJ, APK made it ideal for a community assistance and engagement.
August 2022
Project Name: Tutoring Programme
Project Partner: Dare to Read and UJ Community Engagement Office
Project description
For the month of August, our students returned to Everest Primary school to participate in a tutoring programme. The students assisted primary school learners with school work. The students were divided into smaller groups. Each student was assigned a learner to assist with. Most of the learners have disabilities. The activities that we were involved in included, assistance with reading, preparation for the coming exams that begins next week, teaching learners how to use a dictionary for searching words, reading for the learners. The students also conducted oral exam preparation for the students that have disabilities. We also checked the learners’ books to make sure that they were up to date with their class contents. Our students worked under the supervision of the school teachers. The subjects that we assisted learners with includes Mathematics and English.
June 2022
Project Name: Community Clean-Up Campaign
Project Partner(s): City of Johannesburg, Johannesburg Water, Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department.
Project description
The community of Westbury, Johannesburg, faces with many social challenges. Some of the challenges that the community is faced with include a high rate of crime, drug abuse, and poor sanitation, amongst others. Residents have been complaining about the deteriorating state of infrastructure in Westbury and surrounding areas.
Community engagement highlights 2021
The SPMGP participated in eight community engagement projects over the 2021 academic year. The projects included the clean-up of parks and recreational facilities around the Auckland Park Campus, the participation in the various Mandela Day Projects, the collection and distribution of sanitary products to needy school girls, the delivery of care packages to old age homes and helping primary school learners with homework projects and exam preparation. Students from across the School was used in these initiatives.
Lead as a Global Citizen
The School of Public Management, Governance and Public Policy was invited by Humanitarian Affairs, Asia in conjunction with the United Nations to select fifteen outstanding students to participate in the webinar series titled, Lead as a Global Citizen. The webinar was developed in order to offer young global citizens, as leaders in the 21st century, the opportunity to interact with like-minded students from across the globe. Moreover, the webinar series was cognisant of the impact of the covid-pandemic on young people, where many were feeling insecure in their educational journey. With the risk of the pandemic heightening global inequalities, the webinar series aimed to identify students with excellent potential to lead so that their aspirations to connect, contribute and lead would not go unrecognised.
In order to have the students’ voices to be heard, the webinar focused on Sustainable Development Goal 4: Ensuring Inclusive and Quality Education for all and Promote Lifelong Learning, of which global citizenship is a major aspiration.
Given the School’s ongoing relationship with Humanitarian Affairs, 15 of our outstanding students, with the potential to lead were identified for this virtual event. The main goal of this webinar series was to prepare students for a global career. Students were placed under three streams, namely:
- Lead as a global citizen: Advocacy Series. Title of Webinar: Where should you focus to have the most impact?
- Lead as a global citizen: Begin Series. Title of Webinar: How do I prepare myself for a purposeful and meaningful global career?
- Lead as a global citizen: Collaboration Series: Title of Webinar: what is the best way to gain connection?
The series of webinars took place in the first two weeks of August.
Students who participated were extremely grateful for the opportunity, some of the comments are captured below.
“What I have learnt from the global webinar series is that I should always bear in mind that we live in a time of unparalleled opportunities and that we should always seek for these opportunities”.
“Like many young aspiring leaders, there were times when I felt alone in my academic and career pursuits. I feared that I was too disadvantaged, under-resourced, or too inexperienced to be counted as worthy of participating in ideas and events that are curated to change the world. The H.A Affairs webinar completely altered my perspective and showed me that I and other young people who battle with similar thoughts and feelings of inadequacy can be part of changing the world for the better. Therefore, I am excited about continuing to meet hundreds of like-minded peers who want to be part of building a peaceful, inclusive and sustainable world for all”.
“As an unemployed graduate who had been struggling to get a job, attending the Humanitarian Affairs webinar was very helpful as it gave me much motivation. I got to learn about the importance of making connections. Before attending the webinar I was not aware of how important it was to have a LinkedIn account in order to make connections and networks with different people across the world. Now I feel so empowered and motivated to start networking with people across the world using the skills and knowledge I got from the webinar”.
“The lead as a global citizen World Series webinar promotes global citizenship and empowers students. It empowers us as student through global career guidelines as well as collaborations with a diversity of people. For that purpose, this webinar was an amazing experience to participate in. I have met a number of new people from various countries. Additionally, I made connections with people through different platforms of media as our track of webinar as a group was what is the best way to gain connections and through this webinar I have actually gained some of credible connections with various people which is an amazing experience”.
“Listening to the speaker’s experiences and journeys and what they have went through has motivated and inspired me to work even harder to achieve my goals. I even followed the speakers on LinkedIn to increase my networks”.
It is envisaged that students who participated in this webinar series are now empowered to participate in a post-pandemic world and to lead as global citizens.