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TLA Seminar: A capstone project to enhance entrepreneurial and other critical skills in students
Author: Dr Karin Cattell-Holden
Published: 24/04/2023


You are invited to attend the next quarterly TLA seminar offered by the Division for Learning and Teaching Enhancement 

Speaker:   Dr Albert Strever (Department of Viticulture and Oenology, Faculty of AgriSciences) (TAU Fellow, 2022-2023)

Topic:   A capstone project to enhance entrepreneurial and other critical skills in students of selected AgriSciences Departments

Date:   11 May 2023

Time:  12:45-14:00

Venue:   Room 3008, Faculty of Education (GG Cillié Building)

*Face-to-face only, limited seating available
Please RSVP: Lucinda Lücks, llucks@sun.ac.za or (021) 808 3717

Biography of speaker

Dr Strever is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Viticulture and Oenology in the Faculty of AgriSciences and coordinates the innovation and entrepreneurship activities in the faculty. Although he specialised in and still teaches in Viticulture, his work with INNOVUS and Launchlab as well as in the Winetech innovation committee in promoting new business ideas and development in Agriculture have led to an ambition to specialise in entrepreneurship and innovation/technology integration in higher education. This also led to him registering in 2022 along with the first intake for the Master's degree in Engineering Management (MEM) students at Stellenbosch University. Dr Strever is currently participating in the Teaching Advancement at University (TAU) Fellowship Programme.

Summary of seminar

Dr Strever's Teaching Advancement at University (TAU) fellowship project (2022-2023) focused on identifying ways to integrate entrepreneurial and other future-critical skills into a capstone project. The project was designed to develop a focused strategy in the Faculty of AgriSciences that could meet the demands of preparing students for the volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) environment they will face as graduates. Although some Departments within the Faculty already offer limited exposure to entrepreneurship and related aspects, there is an increasing need for a comprehensive and focused strategy, also in line with the University's current Game Changer projects. The project also involved interaction with other faculties to learn from their experience and has initiated a community of practice within the AgriSciences faculty to address this need. The objective is to minimise disruption to the current curricula while developing a shared resource base for teaching, learning, and assessment related to entrepreneurship and other relevant competencies. The project led to successful changes to one Department's module descriptions to implement the capstone principle, which is currently in process over three study years in the BScAgric (Viticulture & Oenology) programme.

The project's efforts are also complemented by an industrial engineering research assignment, which aims to develop a "radar" for competencies and technologies related to agriculture, which will be discussed briefly.

References