Honoris United Universities Reconvenes Pan-African Network for Third Annual Academic Summit

30 May 2023 – The two-day Honoris Annual Academic Summit 2023 concluded in Cape Town last week, under the theme ‘Education Accelerated: leveraging collaboration and innovation for the next decade’. The annual event once again brought together academic faculty and leadership from across the 15 institutions in the Honoris network to accelerate progress for improved student outcomes.
Held across several of its leading institution campuses in South Africa, the platform provided an opportunity to host critical discussions and thought-provoking sessions that explored responses to the rapidly changing and digitally-driven world of work, which brings increased risk but great opportunity.
Following the second edition in Tunis last year, the Organizing Academic Committee took detailed feedback from participants on this year’s focus areas, finally delivering four core subthemes:

Sessions under these subthemes played a pivotal role in enhancing teachers’ abilities to effectively navigate the challenges and seize the opportunities presented by disruptive technologies in education. This, in turn, yields significant benefits for students as they gain valuable insights and knowledge by sharing and adopting best practices from fellow educators.

In his keynote speech, Honoris United Universities Group CEO, Dr. Jonathan Louw, commented, “This year’s Summit reflects a pivotal moment for us to take the learnings of the past six years and deploy innovation at scale across Africa, starting from the core of our education models. As agents of change in Africa’s education sector, we invest in enhancing our institutions’ value proposition, academic offerings, infrastructure, and faculty development. These are critical objectives for our network, alongside playing our part in building a more sustainable world. The relentless disruption and fragility in higher education, pressures on the employability of graduates to meet skills demands from employers, and increased global geo-political instability make these times somewhat unprecedented. But together, we will forge new paths to continue achieving our mission of Education for Impact.”

With a focus on increasing shared knowledge and mobility, these forums of cross-pollination are an integral part of the Honoris mission. The network recently released its inaugural Student Employability Report, celebrating an 83% employability rate for students across Africa, ensuring graduates entering the workforce are equipped with 21st-century skills to thrive amidst the Fourth Industrial Revolution.