Luzuko Jacobs

Luzuko Jacobs

Director: Communications and Advancement

Reifying our collective social purpose

This site is about Rhodes University’s social commitment. It presents opportunities for strategic collaborations for corporates, trusts, foundations, government and individuals with cutting edge scholarship to strengthen a progressive social compact and shared social purposes.

Among them is an ambitious project to build a world-class Centre for Postgraduate Studies. A third of our students are postgraduates. Such a centre would be a crowning jewel for the only research-intensive University outside of a metropolitan area in South Africa. With the highest proportion of doctoral academic staff per student and a cohort of high-calibre scholar-practitioners overseeing our research, we are not about satisfying ‘credentialing’ demands. Our scholarship is a model of excellence.

Another social investment project aims to house our decorated, world-renowned Institute for Nanotechnology Innovation. The breath-taking success of this Institute in international research belies the infrastructural challenges it faces. Under Distinguished Professor Tebello Nyokong, an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Institute is at the heart of a global network of researchers and product developers. It is a hub for international collaborations involving leading institutes and universities in Africa, America, Europe, and China.

In a locality, province and country facing water shortages threatening development, the case for water research addresses pioneering work taking place in the field of hydrology. Our Institute for Water Research is the standard-bearer for the University’s commitment to the continent through the African Research University’s Alliance. The Institute champions big-picture solutions. This requires scholars to operate across disciplines and with communities to integrate context-specific knowledge to produce solutions that can be implemented at scale.

We also share information about opportunities for partnerships in the transformation space. Our thinking characteristically reaches beyond campus. We believe that an Indigenous Languages Centre could respond to concerns that are relevant not just in the complex African context, but in the Global South broadly.

The vision to elevate the unique scholarly pedigree of RU even higher, cannot happen without wholesome on-campus life experience. Sports and wellness are key. Our University’s location “at the centre” of the Eastern Cape holds numerous advantages for integrated regional sports development in a province renowned for producing many South Africa’s rugby greats. State of the art facilities in a safe, secure and accessible environment hold incalculable benefits for the region.

Our value proposition for an exclusive yet accessible, educational centre of excellence in the south of the continent lies in the vision represented in this book. See the picture and partner with us.

The Centre for Postgraduate Studies (CPGS)

The Centre for Postgraduate Studies at Rhodes University is creating a community of scholars and thought-leaders who have a sense that they are contributing to something bigger than themselves and can spearhead South Africa's development

The Institute for Nanotechnology Innovation (INI)

Behind the grand, polished wood and granite of the Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Science building's entrance hall, down a dim corridor painted and indeterminate, institutional shade, a scuffed rectangle of plastic has been taped across the top board of switches and fuses that controls the power of tens of millions of Rands worth of high-end, precision analysis and measuring equipment

The Institute for Water Research

Research to Change the World: A revolution in academic thinking and practice that could change the lives of millions of Africans is taking place at the Institute for Water Research (IWR) at Rhodes University

Isivivane Fund

The Challenge: There are several challenges to address if we are to maintain our position in educating young people who critically engage with knowledge and its production. These are the young people who are democratic citizens and ethical leaders committed to the values of human understanding, social justice, human development and service to society; and who will become agents of social change and societal transformation

Pathways to Education and Makhanda Circle of Unity

There is starkly unequal access to quality education in Makhanda (formerly Grahamstown). Statistics show that middle-class black learners at fee-paying schools have a three out of four chance of exiting the system with a good-quality matric and entering a top university. By contrast, learners at "non-fee" schools have less than a one in ten chance of reaching this level.

Rhodes University Sports (Student Experience and Culture)

Efforts to develop sports at Rhodes University are driven by one clear goal: to enhance the student experience and long-lasting connection to the University through the provision of quality, accessible sport and active recreation opportunities for all students.