Prof Tshilidzi Marwala, Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Research, Postgraduate Studies and the Library at UJ will present the welcome, while Dr Beverley Damonse, the Acting CEO of the National Research Foundation (NRF) will give the opening remarks.
Dr Cassius Lubisi, Director-General: The Presidency will present the keynote address which will be followed by a tour of the exhibits of the CoE’s.
The Forum is limited to pre-registered guests.
The first session focuses on ‘CoE’s for socio-economic impact’. Dr Zenda Ofir will present on findings of the exploratory evaluation of the socio-economic impacts of selected NRF funding instruments. The presentation will be followed by a round-table discussion by CoE Directors.
The second session will address ‘Science Engagement’, starting with a presentation by Dr Thomas Auf der Heyde, Deputy Director General: Research Support and Development. The presentation will be followed by a round-table discussion by CoE Directors.
‘The CoEs are physical or virtual centres of research that concentrate existing research excellence and capacity and resources to enable researchers to collaborate across disciplines and institutions on long-term projects that are locally relevant and internationally competitive in order to enhance the pursuit of research excellence and capacity development,’ states the NRF on its website.
The DST-NRF CoE for Integrated Mineral and Energy Resource Analysis (CIMERA) is hosted by UJ and co-hosted by Wits, with a number of other South African universities collaborating on the research.
Nationally, 15 CoE’s have been established, with the focus areas of Research/knowledge production; Education and training; Information brokerage; Networking; and Service rendering.
More about the Centre’s of Excellence here: http://www.nrf.ac.za/division/rcce/instruments/centre-of-excellence
December 1, 2023