A tale of two city universities

10 April 2025 - Wits University

University of Southern California doctoral students return for more from Wits.

A delegation of doctoral students from the University of Southern California (USC) first visited Wits in 2024. A new cohort of USC doctoral students returned in April this year to replicate and enhance that experience.

Founded in 1880, USC is the oldest private research university in the state of California. Over 145 years, it has evolved into a global leader in education, research, and innovation. USC is known for its strong academic programmes, influential alumni, and close ties to industries such as entertainment, technology, and business.

The Wits representatives at the 3 April 2025 meeting comprised Dr Samia Chasi, Head of the Internationalisation and Strategic Partnerships Office (ISPO); Mr Moses Pieterse, ISPO; Dr Mahomed Moolla, ISPO consultant; Professor Nicole De Wet Billings, Senior Director Academic Affairs; Associate Professor Emmanuel Ojo, Deputy Head of the Wits School of Education; and Mr Ciaran Heywood, Social Justice Coordinator in the Transformation and Employment Equity Office.

Alan Green, Professor of Clinical Education, and Dr Sabrina Chong, Director of Global Executive Doctor of Education Program represented USC, along with more than 20 USC doctoral students who were present.

International doctoral opportunities

Chasi chaired the meeting and Professor Lynn Morris, Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Research and Innovation, welcomed USC back to Wits.

Morris set the scene, saying, “We pride ourselves on being a research-intensive university and we do that by having a large number of people like you – doctoral students – who drive the research.”  

The Wits Doctoral Academy (WDA), launched in April 2025, provides a structured PhD programme throughout the doctoral journey, via the Graduate Online Learning and Development (GOLD) programme.

“The GOLD programme interfaces with the WDA,” said Morris. “It’s asynchronous – students can do it anytime, on their own terms, and they can choose which modules they want – this provides opportunities for people like you around the world,” she told the USC delegation.

Policy and polycrises

USC’s Professor Alan Green said, “Policy is writ large on the agenda” – assessment of policy being the focus of their visit. Questions and engagement peppered the formal presentations that Wits representatives delivered. Of interest to USC was Wits’ social justice and transformation agenda in relation to national policy.

De Wet-Billings pointed out that the demand for tertiary education is high in SA, where 30% the population is youth. However, key challenges in basic education persist; inequality, access (rural vs township schools), socioeconomic, unemployment, teen pregnancies, and the crisis of child-headed households. regarding inequality and access, persist.

“Education is more than just a personal aspiration in this country; it’s a national imperative that we have to address,” she said. “Economic growth depends on our quality of education. We can’t separate what’s happening in our schools to what’s happening in the Higher Education sector.” Financial constraints are the biggest challenge in higher education, she said.

Heywood, in Wits’ Transformation Office, referred to the “polycrisis” of, for example, increased discrimination through cyberbullying. The South African Constitution, particularly fairness, equity, and redress, guides the work of his office, he said, “We need to break with discriminatory practices of the past.” He mentioned Covid’s impact on mental health and how we understand transformation and “reimagine the kind of university we want to be part of.”

Wits Education Professor Emmanuel Ojo, who integrated his presentation with the USC doctoral students’ research interests, proposed: “What if disruption is no longer the exception, but the new normal? Maybe we need a different lens.” He suggested that ubuntu and empathy are key for transformative leadership in an innovative educational system. “This University is doing so much,” he said. “We need to be very compassionate.”

The USC doctoral students asked questions relating to Wits’ programmes with local schools, decolonisation (a big issue at Wits but not a national imperative), how students access Wits and which schools they come from (feeder schools), and how they then navigate the University (Wits provides workshops on GBV, financial planning, managing your NSFAS money, for example).

Returning to policy, a USC delegate asked how being a BRICS country will impact research. Moolla said that that SA government contributes to BRICS and that many Wits academics take part in the BRICS network of universities. “BRICS is included in national internationalisation policy,” he said.

City university challenges

One-hundred Wits doctoral students are enrolled in the inaugural WDA pilot programme, which incorporates student wellbeing and an introduction to Johannesburg, since Wits – like USC – is a city university with a diversity of students.

However, following the US President’s removal of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) in policy, USC has “been stripped of this as a strategy,” said Green, emphasising that diversity, equity and inclusion should be specifically named, not abbreviated. He added that the American president’s directive nonetheless provides collaborative opportunities. “We should collaborate and ensure we’re not doing this work in isolation,” he said.

Chasi alluded to the role of institutions like Wits in “pulling basic and higher education together,” citing student feeding schemes and online learning from home as examples. “This brings it back to the ‘for good’ role that Wits plays,” she said.

Green concluded, “We really appreciate being able to check in a year later. The work is really phenomenal; the work you do around social justice. This is a university that’s leaning into its complexities.”