The recipients of the prestigious 2010 Mandela Rhodes Scholarship were announced on Tuesday 6 October, with three Rhodes students being included in the group of 30 students from around Africa.
The recipients of the prestigious 2010 Mandela Rhodes Scholarship were announced on Tuesday 6 October, with three Rhodes students being included in the group of 30 students from around Africa.
Beth Vale, Athambile Masola and Clive Eley are the Rhodes recipients of the scholarship. The Mandela Rhodes Foundation (MRF) aims to offer educational opportunities to African citizens with academic and leadership potential to study at a tertiary institution in South Africa.
The scholarship is more than just a glorified bursary. During their year in residence, Mandela Rhodes scholars take part in a mentorship programme and attend four workshops based on the scholarhip’s founding principles of reconciliation, education, entrepreneurship and leadership.
The workshops provide scholars with the opportunity to discuss and debate the various challenges young African leaders are likely to encounter. "It [the workshops]is an amazing opportunity to network with other Mandela Rhodes scholars from across Africa and develop a clear picture of the contribution one can make in terms of the scholarship’s four guiding principles," says Eley, who is currently studying toward an honours degree in chemistry.
As the 2009 Rhodes sports development liaison, Eley organised workshops at the university that aimed to promote community engagement through sport. He also initiated and co-ordinated the Currie Street Courts Project that entailed converting old tennis courts into a multi-purpose sports recreational facility.
"Sport is an excellent vehicle for social upliftment," says Eley. "The learners are always enthusiastic about playing a game and through sport they’re able to learn a variety of skills like leadership, teamwork, commitment, sportsmanship and the value of being healthy.
Rhodes sports clubs are in the ideal position – with facilities and human capital – to promote this positive force within Grahamstown schools." Eley’s interests however, extend beyond sport. He was one of the founders of the Rhini Debating League, a competitive debating league for schools in and around Grahamstown and in 2008, he coached the Eastern Cape schools team that participated in the South African National Schools Competition in Johannesburg.
Masola, who will be studying toward a masters degree in African Studies and Education next year, is also a keen debater and has been involved in various programmes that train learners around the Eastern Cape. Masola is committed to developing and empowering the youth and says, "I think empowerment for young people is important if democracy is to make sense to them. By having leaders from a young age, you’re almost guaranteed that they will realise the role they have to play and hopefully they’ll live it as adults when it it counts the most."
While serving on the Student Representative Council in 2008, Masola started the Representative Council of Learners training programme which aims to work with local learners to build leadership capacity in Grahamstown.
She developed and facilitated workshops that are designed to challenge learners to identify problems at their schools and come up with creative ways to help fix them. She also played a key role in securing over R600 000 from the National Youth Service for a range of youth projects.
Vale, whose family is from Grahamstown, is in her final year of her Bachelor of Arts degree in politics and philosophy. She has been an active member of the Student HIV/Aids Resistance Campaign (Sharc) since her first year and served as president in 2008 and 2009.
During her two terms as president, the society’s membership increased by 43 percent and the number of peer educators trained per year quadruppled. What she is most proud of however, are the Sharc HIV/Aids Benefit Concert and Art Auction which raised over R100 000 for local HIV/Aids NGOs, and the three day training camp Sharc hosted for 35 local learners in May this year.
Through the scholarship, the MRF hopes to create a network of principled leaders with the capacity and will to advance themselves and their countries, something Vale, Masola and Eley all aspire to do. "I loved the thought of being part of a group of young, ethical leaders who are pasisonate about social change and who come from a variety of different backgrounds and academic fields," Vale says, speaking about what attracted her to the scholarship. "I just kept thinking how powerful such a group could be in affecting positive change and how much we could learn from each other."
The four outgoing Mandela Rhodes scholars from Rhodes University reflect on their experiences:
Alinka Brutsch:
The 2009 Mandela Rhodes scholars are known as the tummy-rubbers. It’s a long story but it involves one of the scholars telling our group she was so happy to meet us she wanted to rub our bellies. The term spread like wildfire. I thought her saying that was really rather strange. I have since lightened up – but only a little bit.
I clearly remember the terror I felt the first time all 28 of us were asked to go around the circle and tell each other how we felt. About what? Why? Who cares? I don’t know any of these people, I thought frantically.
I’m not the kind of person who really enjoys talking about my feelings.
I also don’t use phrases like “hold the space” and “bring your light into the room” and “remember to exhale” in daily conversation. I pulled my feet up on my seat, wrapped my arms around my knees and stayed like that for the remainder of the five-day workshop.
At the next workshop, one of our sessions focussed on transcending the walls of separatism. “When people pull their legs close to them,” one of the mentors said, addressing everyone but staring at me, “it means they’re building a wall. They’re not letting anyone in.” I wanted to kill her. To prove her wrong, I placed my feet firmly on the ground and unfolded my arms. And I spoke about my feelings – a little.
I have a good laugh whenever I think about how seriously I took everything this year, especially during the first two workshops. Yet within that laugh there’s a little tinge of regret. I’ve realised I didn’t have to talk about my feelings to participate – I just needed to have an open mind and be present. That’s possibly one of the most important lessons I’ve learned this year. And not to take myself too seriously.
Siyabulela Nomoyi:
I’m not so good at celebrating or getting excited about something, so when I received a call from the Mandela Rhodes Foundation telling me that I’ve got the scholarship, I just said “Uhmm, ok, thanks” and that was it! But deep inside I was filled with joy and was already imagining a transformed me at the end of 2009.
Being a Mandela Rhodes Scholar has been both a lesson and a contribution to the value of my career on a social and academic level. I don’t want to say resort to the clihe of saying it was a life changing experience but it challenged me, made me think more critically, be more innovative, participate in social issues and best of all, implement my skills.
Of course, among the gifts of being a NMS was the once in a lifetime chance to meet Madiba himself. But throughout the year, the Mandela Rhodes Scholarship really proved that it is not just another scholarship.
The leadership courses they provided really did a lot of good. I will cherish those experiences throughout my career, and the amazing people the scholarship has introduced me changed my life.
To be in the same room with people that come from different backgrounds, cultures and ethics, but having the same vision for Africa and its people has been a remarkable experience. The debates, both formal and informal really tackled challenges and made me think about my future, my responsibility as a citizen and my role as a leader.
All the nervousness for interviews, running around to get my application done, and building enough momemtum to be able to be considered for an interview where all worth it. All the lessons and experiences that I have gained really inspire me to be what I want to be.
Katherine Furman:
It is late evening and we sit on the verandah of our cabin in Kariega, seven or so of us Mandela Rhodes scholars. In the distance we can see the lights of Kenton and we chat about our plans for the year ahead over coffee. This is our last time together as the Mandela Rhodes cohort of 2009.
Later that night we will pack our bags and in the morning we will go off on our own adventures. What strikes me most in this moment is that I should have kept better journals of my year as a Mandela Rhodes Scholar, so that in the future I can revisit the rollercoaster experience and so that at some point I could figure out how this group of disconnected scholars became such close knit friends.
There are a number of ways to fund your postgraduate studies, but the Mandela Rhodes way is the most special. It is more than a pat on the head and a deposit in your bank account- it is an experience. The two requirements for receiving the scholarship are that you attend supplementary courses around the country and that you participate in the mentorship programme.
I quite happily signed on the dotted line to both of these conditions without a clue of what to expect. I had no idea that my mentor would end up attending my Masters thesis proposal (what a disaster of a presentation) or making me lentil soup when I got the flu. I also certainly did not anticipate that I would be expected to spend seven silent hours in the Pielansberg wilderness on a vision quest.
Despite my ignorance upon entering into the Mandela Rhodes programme I have learnt a great deal. Most of all I have discovered how powerful an experience it is to be surrounded by other excited people and how much energy can be generated in those contexts. A double espresso has nothing on a Mandela Rhodes gathering. The scholarship was initially started with the intention of fostering exceptional leadership in Africa. If the oomph of the 2009 scholars is anything to go by, then I suspect we are headed in the right direction.
Ingrid Cloete:
When I arrived at the first workshop, I soon realised that this was a place where my particular blend of cynicism and reason would have to take a backseat. Here were people who complemented my energy (it’s beautiful, apparently), hugged one another for full minutes at a time and who looked honestly disappointed when I answered a query about my wellbeing in under a hundred words.
By the time we’d all discussed how we were feeling, lit a candle to represent "our light" and danced in a circle singing a song about a spirit in the trees, I was desperately scanning the walls for the hidden camera. What did these people want me to do – hug Africa better? Although these initial sessions seemed overly emotional for my law student’s mind, it was through this immediate sense of intimacy that the scholars instantly bonded as a group – not merely as a network of young African leaders, but as human beings – as friends.
In this space, I was able for the first time in my life to really get to know myself. To interrogate my ideas, beliefs and values, and come to understand why I hold them. To discover who I am when I’m not striving to achieve the next goal – really, in short, just to be me. I was expecting a year of intense debate, of intellectualising, of solving Africa’s problems. Although these debates did happen (and wow, were they inspiring), when I look back on my year, my highlights aren’t really intellectual in any sense.
They include running around with Kershan, pretending to be an ostrich; teaching Masasa the Philosopher’s Drinking Song over a bottle of chardonnay and lying on the trampoline with Kath and Alinka, debating how to keep the LLB monster from eating my soul. I have come away from this year with my own life so enriched by the lives of such talented, inspiring and real people.
I have laughed, I’ve cried and I’ve had amazing adventures with new and very special friends. And if I had to get a little touchy feely to achieve that, then it was absolutely worth it.
