Deputy Vice-Chancellors
Professor T Nhlapo | Professor C Soudien | Professor D Visser | Professor Sandra Klopper
Professor T Nhlapo
Deputy Vice-Chancellor
Professor Thandabantu Nhlapo is the senior deputy vice-chancellor. He acts for the Vice-Chancellor during periods of absence and he provides direct support to the Vice-Chancellor in the management and co-ordination of the university's special projects.
Nhlapo's main portfolio is to address the strategic goal of making UCT an Afropolitan university. His portfolio includes Chair of the University Science Humanities & Engineering Partnerships in Africa (USHEPiA) Management Committee.
He has executive oversight for: human resources, properties and services, staff development, PASS staff and policy matters, and physical infrastructure,
Profile
Professor Nhlapo rejoined UCT as a deputy vice-chancellor in August 2004 from the South African Embassy in Washington DC, where he was the deputy chief of Mission. Previously, he had been a member of the law faculty at UCT from 1990, achieving the rank of professor in the Department of Private Law and head of department from 1994, before his appointment to the South African Law Commission, where he served from 1996 to 2000.
Nhlapo obtained his BA (Law) at the University of Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland (Roma, Lesotho), and then went on to receive an LLB (Hons) from the University of Glasgow, and a DPhil from Oxford University in the UK. During his tenure in the law faculty at UCT he taught the law of persons, family law and African customary law, and was promoted to full professorship in 1995.
Prior to joining UCT, he was dean of the social science faculty at the University of Swaziland.
While working for the South African Law Commission he chaired the project committee on customary law which produced a report on customary marriages, resulting in the Recognition of Customary Marriages Act passed by Parliament in 1998.
He was also appointed to chair a national commission to investigate disputes and claims arising in the traditional leadership sector. The commission, styled on the Commission on Traditional Leadership Disputes and Claims, was appointed in terms of legislation enacted in 2003.
UCT Portfolio
Portfolio responsibilities relating to UCT strategic goals
- Afropolitan niche
Additional responsibilities and executive oversight
- Senior support & acting for Vice-Chancellor
- Human resources
- Property and services
- Staff development
- Executive oversight: Physical infrastructure
- PASS staff & policy matters (UCTEU negotiations)
- Special projects e.g. UCT response 2010
Departments and individual reporting lines to VC and DVCs
- ED Human Resources
- ED Properties & Services
- Project Manager in VC's office
Committee membership ('Ch' indicates chair responsibilities)
- University Human Resource Committee
- Honorary Professors Standing Committee (Ch)
- EU Consultative Forum (Co-Ch)
- Staff Development (Ch)
PASS Forum (Ch)
- Senior (PASS) Staff Management Advisory Group (SSMAG) (Ch)
- Operations Management Advisory Group (Opsmag) (Ch)
- Senate Nominations Committee (Ch)
- University Building & Development Committee
- Employee Relations Management Committee
- Space Allocation Committee
- USHEPiA Management Committee (Ch)
- University Development Committee
- University Human Resources Committee
Committees outside UCT
- Board Member - Sasol Inzalo (rep Ukukhula Trust)
- USHEPiA Advisory Board (Ch)
- USHEPiA International Steering Committee (Ch)
Professor C Soudien
Deputy Vice-Chancellor
Professor Crain Soudien's portfolio is to support the Vice-Chancellor in the area of transformation and social responsiveness. His portfolio responsibilities related to the university strategic goals are transformation, public schools; and crime and security.
Soudien has executive oversight in the areas of social responsiveness; student affairs; the staff experience; and government and external relations.
Profile
Professor Soudien has been studying and writing on issues relating to transformation for the last 20 years, establishing himself as a recognised authority. He has penned more than 60 articles in refereed journals, as well as numerous newspaper and magazine articles; written more than 60 book chapters; published a book and co-authored another; edited four monographs and reviewed a dozen books.
He is regularly invited to speak on these matters at universities and forums around the country. He has been consulted by institutions inside and outside the country on policies they are developing with respect to the issues of equality, racism and other forms of discrimination. These consultancies include, inter alia, Novalis, other South African universities, Flemish Interuniversity Agency, the Education Policy Unit Quarterly Review, the Centre for Education Policy Development, the Department of Education, the Western Cape Education Department, the Human Rights Commission, UNESCO, the Council for Higher Education and the Ministerial Review Committee on the Status of School Governing Bodies in 2006.
In 2009 he chaired the Ministerial Review Committee into Transformation in Higher Education. He has been acting as Deputy Vice-Chancellor at UCT since April 2009.
As a sociologist of youth Professor Soudien has followed the process of development of young people in the institutions of the family, the school and the university, and developed a practical appreciation of the complexity of the different paths to adulthood young people follow in this country. He has specialist insights into the social nature of how young people learn about their own identities and their relationships to the major social structures in society.
Professor Soudien has been associated with UCT in a number of capacities since registering as a student for the first time in 1973. At this university he earned his Bachelor of Arts degree and Bachelor of Arts (Hons) in Comparative African Government and Law; Master of Arts degree in Comparative African Government and Law; and his Higher Diploma of Education (Post Graduate) Secondary.
He also holds a Bachelor of Education degree from the University of South Africa, and a Master's in Education and PhD from the State University of New York at Buffalo in the USA. He has received numerous awards during his career, including a Fulbright Scholarship; Visiting Scholarship to the University of Washington in the USA; Visiting Fellowship to the Institute of Development Studies in Sussex, UK; a British Council Exchange Scholarship to the University of Sussex; and a Visiting Scholarship to York University in Canada. He joined the faculty of the School of Education at UCT in 1988.
Outside of UCT, Professor Soudien serves as a founding trustee and Chair of the District Six Museum Foundation; honorary secretary of The Silvertree Educare Trust; Chair of the Independent Examinations Board; board member of Krakadouw Trust; Director and Deputy Chair of the Cape Town Festival; councillor of the Nelson Mandela Museum; President of the World Council of Comparative Education Societies; and on the Goedgedacht Forum for Social Reflection, The South African Canadian Studies Association and the Maskew Miller Longman Foundation.
Professor Soudien has been leading initiatives to help students discuss South Africa's legacy of racism and inequality, as well as issues of sexuality, masculine identity, language, culture and their significance for places of learning. He has helped the university examine the leadership models that are presented to students. He has challenged students to think critically about what kinds of attitudes and values they wish to develop as members of the UCT community.
Portfolio: Transformation & Social Responsiveness
Portfolio responsibilities relating to UCT strategic goals
- Transformation
- Public schools
- Crime & security initiatives
Additional responsibilities and executive oversight
- Social responsiveness
- Student affairs
- Staff experience
- Government & external relations
Departments and individual reporting lines to VC and DVCs
- ED Student Affairs
- Director Transformation Services
- Ombud (for co-ordination purposes)
- Director IPD (dotted line for social responsiveness)
Committee membership ('Ch' indicates chair responsibilities)
- Institutional Forum (Co-Ch)
- Admissions & Progression Committee (Ch)
- University Transformation Committee
- Residences Committee (Ch)
- Sports Council
- Undergraduate Studies Funding Committee (Ch)
- University Social Responsiveness Committee (Ch)
- University Student Affairs Committee (Ch)
- University Development Committee
- College of Wardens
- Undergraduate Student Funding Committee (Ch)
Committees outside UCT
- CHEC - director
- Independent examinations board (Ch)
- MSEP Board (Ch)
Professor D Visser
Deputy Vice-Chancellor
Professor Danie Visser's portfolio relates to the strategic goal of research: its profile, impact and engagement; as well as climate change and sustainable development initiatives.
He has executive oversight for: faculty affairs, postgraduate matters and academic staff and policy matters including UCTAU negotiations.
Profile
Professor Visser is professor of private law at UCT and a recipient of a National Research Foudation A2 rating. He was educated in South Africa and the Netherlands, obtaining doctorates in law from Pretoria University in 1980 and the University of Leiden in 1985.
He is a former dean of the Faculty of Law at UCT (1996-1998) and a sometime holder of the Huber C Hurst Eminent Visiting Scholar Chair at the University of Florida. At UCT, he teaches comparative law, comparative legal history, the law of delict, and unjust enrichment.
In recent years he has taught comparative law in the Juris Doctor programme at the University of Melbourne, Australia, as a visiting professor. He is chair of the South African chapter of the International Academy of Comparative Law, and a former president of the Southern African Society of Legal Historians.
He has also been chair of the specialist committee of the National Research Foundation's rating panel for law. He serves in various editorial capacities on numerous publications, including the South African Law Journal (as editor) and the UK Restitution Law Review.
He has formal associations with many international universities, including the University of Tëbingen and the University of Regensburg in Germany, and Scotland's University of Aberdeen. He is member of the Academy of Science of South Africa, the World Academy of Art and Science and an associate member of the International Academy of Comparative Law.
Portfolio: Research & Academic Affairs
Portfolio responsibilities relating to UCT strategic goals
- Research: profile, impact & engagement
- Climate change & sustainable development initiative
Additional responsibilities and executive oversight
- Faculty affairs
- Postgraduate matters
- Academic staff & policy matters (UCTAU negotiations)
Departments and individual reporting lines to VC and DVCs
- Deans (7)
- Director of GSB
- Director Research Office
- Director Research Contracts & Intellectual Property Services
- Director Postgraduate Funding Office
Committee membership ('Ch' indicates chair responsibilities)
- University Research Committee (Ch)
- Postgraduate Studies Funding Committee (Ch)
- Doctoral Degrees Board (Ch)
- Deans (Ch)
- Consultative Forum on Academic Staff Matters (Ch)
- Board for Graduate Studies (Ch)
- Joint Staff (clinical) Advisory Committee (Co-Ch)
- Academic Heads Working Group (Ch)
- Ad hom promotions (all faculties)
- College of Fellows
- College of Fellows Young Researcher Award Committee (Ch)
- University Finance Committee
- University Development Committee
- URC Committee on Research Reviews (Ch)
- IIDMM Management Board (Ch)
- Boards of Centres of Excellence:
- UCT/NRF/DST CoE in Catalysis (Ch)
- UCT/NRF/DST CoE in Birds as Keys to Biodiversity Conservation (Ch)
- Research Development Awards Committee (Ch)
- Honorary Degrees Committee
- Academic Freedom Committee
- University ICT Committee
- Vera Davie Study & Research Bursary (Ch)
Committees outside UCT
- CAPRISA Advisory Board
- Children's Institute Board
- UCT/CSIR Steering Committee
- Iziko Museums Advisory Committee (Co-Ch)
- UCT Press Editorial Board
Professor Sandra Klopper
Deputy Vice-Chancellor
Professor Sandra Klopper, took office as deputy vice-chancellor on 1 January 2012. Her portfolio includes providing leadership in the areas of teaching and learning, and academic planning. She has executive oversight of UCT Libraries and Information & Communication Technology Services (ICTS). Klopper uses the title of Professor in the Faculty of Humanities.
Profile
Klopper has an honours degree in art history (cum laude) from the University of the Witwatersrand, where she returned to write her PhD thesis, tracing the socio-political histories of various traditionalist art forms from present-day northern KwaZulu-Natal.
She also has an MA in art and social reform from the University of East Anglia, UK. She lectured in art history at Wits from 1981 to 1988.
In 1989 Klopper joined UCT as a lecturer specialising in African art, and was promoted first to senior lecturer, then to associate professor, before accepting an appointment at Stellenbosch University (SU) as head of visual arts in June 2001. She became vice dean of arts (drama, fine arts and music) at Stellenbosch in January 2006, and accepted an additional appointment as acting head of the music department in mid-2006.
Klopper helped spearhead curriculum development at UCT, SU and UP.
She has played an active role in various community projects and initiatives. For many years she was the treasurer of the Visual Arts Group (a subsidiary of the now defunct Cultural Workers Congress of the Western Cape). From 2004 to 2006 she chaired the committee formed by the Western Cape Government to commission the Peace Laureate sculpture project at the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront in Cape Town.
Along with this strong performance in management and leadership roles, Klopper is an accomplished academic. She has written extensively on: the traditionalist art of southern African communities, including the expressive culture of migrant labourers and their families; African fashion, textiles and beadwork; various aspects of contemporary South African youth culture; and the work of several contemporary South African artists. She has published three books in collaboration with photographer Peter Magubane, and has served on the editorial boards of African Arts (UCLA) and NKA: Journal of Contemporary African Art (Cornell).
She has a B2 rating from the National Research Foundation. She has longstanding links with colleagues at various universities and museums in the US and the UK. She also has close ties with colleagues at Makarere University in Uganda and at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, where she supervised a PhD thesis funded through UCT's USHEPiA initiative. She continues to collaborate with her former Tanzanian student, Rehema Nchimbi, on various projects.