Unisa 2008 Research Report - University of South Africa

An important component of the implementation
plan is to provide residences for postgraduate
students and those visiting scholars who require
accommodation. These will consist of a combination
of houses and ats to suit varying needs (for example
family accommodation and single rooms).
The advantages of the Institute’s location on the
Sunnytown site (which is to be developed partly
as a commercial zone with facilities like banks,
hotels and coffee shops) are its closeness to the
Gautrain station, its proximity to the Unisa Main
Campus and library, and the availability of schools
and nursery schools nearby. This means that
students or scholars who opt to visit the Institute
for six months or longer and who will bring their
families will be assured of a congenial, safe and
convenient location in which to pursue their studies.
Scholarships and studentships will be strictly by
application only and applicants will be advised
if there is a waiting list. It may also happen that a
visiting scholar or student may be offered a place in
the centre but if accommodation is fully booked,
that person will be advised to nd alternative
accommodation with guidance from staff in the
centre.
The Institute of Graduate Studies is envisaged as the
rst of its kind on the African continent.
Several South African universities have graduate
schools but these are usually conned to the
humanities and social sciences and do not have
room space for visiting scholars.
The decision to include accommodation is a vital
part of the plan to attract those African scholars
who may prefer to take up fellowships at Unisa
rather than at prestigious universities in the Uk
or USA, rstly because it will be considerably
cheaper to do so and, secondly because Unisa has
important archival holdings in its library which
ought to be more prominently advertised as a
rich source of research for visiting scholars. But,
the Institute is primarily a place in which master’s
and doctoral students will study and receive
appropriate guidance and coaching, not only by
Unisa staff but also by visiting fellows.
G R A D U AT I O N S TAT I S T I C S
headcounts headcounts % graduates graduates % graduation rate
doctoral degree 775 0.30% 40 0.26% 5.16%
honours degree 16 771 6.38% 2 601 16.79% 15.51%
magister technologiae degree 333 0.13% 4 0.03% 1.20%
master’s degree 3 877 1.48% 336 2.17% 8.67%
postgraduate diploma/certificate 5 413 2.06% 925 5.97% 17.09%
postgraduate 27 169 10.34% 3 906 25.21% 14.38%
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