#NewGlobalUni
Esther Ngumbi
23 June 2020
Dr Esther Ngumbi is assistant professor of entomology and African American studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign. She is a native of Kenya and earned her PhD from Auburn University. She is an entomologist (chemical ecologist) and her research over the years has focused on understanding the multifaceted uses of chemical signals (both volatile and non-volatile) by herbivores, natural enemies, plants and their associated microorganisms and insects.
Believing that global sustainability issues like those of hunger and food insecurity affect all of us, Ngumbi has stepped up both as a researcher and a food security advocate and a senior fellow with the Aspen Institute New Voices and has continued to demonstrate visionary and inspirational leadership in the pursuit of a sustainable future-where hunger and food insecurity become history.
She has contributed immensely to global discussions in several areas including science policy, agricultural development, food security, gender issues, youth leadership, global education and sustainability through over 150 opinion pieces published in several international media outlets.
Ngumbi is the recipient of several national and international awards and serves as a mentor to many students and several organisations including Clinton Global University Initiative and President Obama’s Young African Leadership Initiative.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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Unleashing the new global university
A series of challenging conversations
Conversation #5: How does changing the medium change the way of doing things?
Monday, 7 September 2020, 17:30–18:30 (CAT/SAST)
Covid-19 has radically changed the ways that universities do everything: research, teaching, social responsiveness and internationalisation. International students have gone home or are in lockdown unable to physically experience the countries they are visiting; they are completing courses through remote learning. Conferences have gone online. Researchers are collaborating on virtual platforms.
Ironically, the lockdown has seen an opening up of connections, as distance ceases to be a barrier. While the opportunity to tangibly experience the location has gone, there have been many positive aspects to these changes, which universities have embraced, and are looking to take into the future.
The great hope has been that we can use the new technologies on which we are now relying during the pandemic to be more creative in the ways we shape international experiences and collaborations, and to do so in ways that lessen the negative characteristics of the old model.
How will changing the medium challenge the nature of global relationships? What have the opportunities been to decentre and disturb existing internationalised power relations?
This session will creatively address how more equal relationships might be formed; how digitally mediated forms of global engagement might enable what Nancy Fraser calls “participatory parity”.
Host
- Mamokgethi Phakeng, vice-chancellor, University of Cape Town, South Africa
Moderator
- Laura Czerniewicz, professor, director: Centre for Innovation in Learning and Teaching (CILT), University of Cape Town, South Africa
Participants
Videos
News
Conversation #4: Postgraduate researchers: can we rethink the international experience?
Monday, 24 August 2020, 17:30–18:30 (CAT/SAST)
What are the markers of a truly enriching postgraduate experience? From a global north perspective, being able to travel abroad to access resources and expertise from elsewhere in the globe, create new networks and build a CV have been almost taken for granted and a central tenet of the postgraduate experience. Postgraduates in the global south have had far fewer opportunities for mobility. The COVID-19 pandemic has ended international travel for all postgraduates, creating an opportunity to stop and think: can we make the postgraduate international experience more equitable by going virtual? In this challenging conversation, we explore what will be lost and gained if postgraduates gain an international experience as deskchair travellers.
Host
- Mamokgethi Phakeng, vice-chancellor, University of Cape Town
Moderator
- Sue Harrison, deputy vice-chancellor for research and internationalisation, University of Cape Town
Participants
Videos
News
Conversation #3: Undergraduate student mobility: are virtual experiences a realistic substitute?
Monday, 27 July 2020, 17:30–18:30 (CAT/SAST)
The number of undergraduate students travelling for part or all of their degrees has increased dramatically in the last few years. Some of these students are on exchange or scholarships; the majority pay large fees, which increasingly form a substantive portion of the income of their destination institutions. The pandemic brought most of this mobility to a halt. These international experiences can be rich, even life-changing: both the exposure to new ways of thinking, but also to new ways of living. But they come at a cost – both to the environment, and often to the student, meaning only the well-off can afford them. Using what we are learning from the global shift to emergency online teaching and learning, can we envisage a more sustainable, equitable model? What are the most valuable aspects of the international experience for students, and for which of those can we find creative virtual alternatives?
Host
- Mamokgethi Phakeng, vice-chancellor, University of Cape Town
Moderator
- Sue Harrison, deputy vice-chancellor for research and internationalisation, University of Cape Town, South Africa
Participants
Videos
News
Conversation #2: International collaborations: how can we shift the power towards Africa?
Monday, 13 July 2020, 17:30–18:30 (CAT/SAST)
The second event focused on whether or not the disruption to the current higher education model can bring about a shift in the centre of gravity in international collaborations and help us to reimagine a different approach that empowers African institutions to take the lead in collaborative projects and partnerships both within and outside the continent.
Host
- Mamokgethi Phakeng, vice-chancellor, University of Cape Town
Moderator
- Salome Maswime, professor in global surgery, University of Cape Town
Participants
Videos
News
17 Jul 2020 Republished
Conversation #1: Academic conferences: how virtual can we go?
Monday, 29 June 2020, 17:30–18:30 (CAT/SAST)
Our first event focused on the future of conferences and international meetings. Most of us will by now have attended virtual versions of large international gatherings that were intended to be physical get-togethers. Should we consider this to be the future of conferences? What are the gains and losses of online conferences, workshops and consortium meetings? How can conferences be reinvented?
Host
- Mamokgethi Phakeng, vice-chancellor, University of Cape Town
Moderator
- Kelly Chibale, professor in organic chemistry, director of H3D, University of Cape Town
Participants
Videos
News
