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Paper Abstracts—In Alphabetical Order of Presenters
39
CHALLENGE YOUR CHALLENGES
MARGARET BENNETT, CYNTHIA KAIMU
SME Development and Support at the Polytechnic of Namibia Centre for
Entrepreneurial Development (CED)
ABSTRACT
This paper provides a brief background of the current socioeconomic
situation in Namibia and the pertinent role of Small and
Medium Enterprises (SME’s) in combating the high level of unemployment.
Inadequate capacity in both the public and private sectors
has been identified as one of the main bottlenecks for sustainable
development in Namibia.
It is imperative that educational Institutions join national efforts to
spearhead and develop required skills. CED provides training and
mentorship programmes with funding from development partners in
the quest to challenge national challenges. These produced astounding
results evidenced in the case studies below:
Mr. Jeremia Kahambea is owner and manager of Jergo’s Cleaning
Services CC’s, a waste management business established after the
outsourcing of a section of Waste Management by a local
Municipality. Mr. Kahambea, although experienced in waste
management had inadequate business management skills. Today
after the training and mentorship through CED, he operates a
successful business with more than 25 employees and a growing
client base.
Ms. Katrina Haidula owns Pillow Manufacturing and Distributor CC,
a pillow manufacturing bussiness. She enrolled for CED training and
mentorship programme that equipped her with relevant skills,
enabling her to increase her production capacity, sales and in,
increasing monthly profits.
RE-CURRICULATING: CAN AN ENGINEERING LECTURER
CONTRIBUTE TO MEET 21 ST CENTURY AFRICA’S CHAL-
LENGES?
KANT ELIAB KANYARUSOKE
Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Cape Town, South Africa
ABSTRACT
Africa faces great challenges in harnessing its resources for the
benefit of its people in an increasingly competitive world. Lack of
understanding of engineering, and failure to deploy modern technology
are arguably the root cause of these challenges. The continent’s
engineering education institutions are therefore expected to
help change this. But they have their own well documented problems.
I review these and point out others. I argue that solutions to
some can come from within the academics and institutions with or
without government help:Curriculum, textbooks, student motivation,
etc. are addressed. I propose and illustrate the principle of Student
Participatory Dynamic Flexibility in Curriculum. It is shown that the
approach can help hasten learning of engineering and be used as
one of the means to help transform Africa’s supply chains. Finally,
recommendations to various university based stake holders are
given: the students – who should be adaptive to rapid changes in
curricula; lecturers – who must adopt flexibility, seek industrial exposure,
exploit the technological vacuum and write suitable books; the
administrators – who should re-examine policies in line with relative
values of teaching, research and society service.
Key words: Engineering curriculum; Engineering education; Africa’s
challenges; Thermodynamics course.