Masakh'iSizwe Bursary Programme: Vision and objectives

Summary

This presents the vision and objectives of the Masakh' iSizwe Bursary Programme.

Vision

The vision of the Professional Development Directorate is to create the best opportunities for its existing employees and communities in order to improve socio-economic conditions through education and applied developmental learning by making available cohorts of professionals in transport, engineering and built environment fields. This is critical for the growth of the economy of the province, country and the continent of Africa.

These professionals will be developed in:

  • Learning – measured by formal academic results as well as a commitment to ‘lifelong learning’.
  • Citizenship – through developing an ethos of non-racialism, social justice and environmental awareness.
  • Service – through learners participating in building poor rural communities.

Objectives

Short Term

Empower youth that are financially disadvantaged by providing them an opportunity to gain access to tertiary education to obtain a qualification through full-time study in a Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) within the Western Cape.
Provide bursars with support that goes beyond financial support to unlock and maximise their potential to enable them to complete their qualification.

Medium Term

  • Enable cost-sharing in respect of bursary programme through the Bursary Collaboration Venture.
  • Pull together resources to maximise and ensure sustainability & continuous development. 

Long Term

  • Establish partnerships with private sector, NGOs, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and other spheres of government through the Bursary Collaboration Venture.
  • Strengthen linkages with secondary schools, HEIs, TVETs to influence the academic curricula to be aligned to the requirements of the labour market and professional bodies in the transport, engineering and built environment to meet the needs of both public and private sector employers.
  • Provide a structured Professional Development Training Programme to enable employees to attain and/or retain professional registration.
  • Create a conducive environment for sharing and transferring of experience, expertise, competencies and/or skills through the coaching and mentoring programme.
  • Address skills shortage by creating a pool of continuous flowing young talented registered professionals.
  • Reduce the vacancy rate by creating a feeding pipeline for filling vacant posts by employing graduates. 

Guiding Principles

  • Establish a learning framework with the Higher Education Institutions, which includes service learning opportunities, critical engagement and approaches to lifelong learning.
  • Involve learners in voluntary work.
  • Provide learners with knowledge and exposure to assist them to understand their environmental and cultural issues.
  • Involve parents and/or members of the communities of origin of the learners in support for the learners.
  • Facilitate network opportunities across cohorts of learners.
  • Track the career paths of learners.
  • Identify and review engineering and built environment needs in the economy.