Donning the robes of rector at Stellenbosch University, Deresh Ramjugernath has to be a visionary leader, on top of being an academic, mentor, trailblazer, and family man. He spoke to JEAN MEIRING about life, leadership, and learning to call the Winelands home.
Deresh Ramjugernath is a man freighted with a staggering tower of academic publications, glossed by thousands of citations. Lately, he has added to that bounty his roles in university management. Yet, surprisingly, the new rector and vice-chancellor of Stellenbosch University (SU) has the air of a steely Peter Pan about him.
“I wasn’t academically inclined in my younger years. Especially in primary school, I was more sports-oriented,” Deresh says.
By now, he’s a veteran of many new-kid-on-the-block interviews. Before him, there has been only one person of colour in a seat that, it seems, is getting hotter by the year. Perhaps more profoundly, he is the first incumbent who doesn’t speak Afrikaans as a first language, although he understands it perfectly and can hold his own.
“In high school,” he continues, “with the right kind of teachers and influences, things came together. My parents played an important role. I started seeing the importance of academics.”
Yet, even as an engineering undergraduate at the erstwhile University of Natal, Deresh was not starry-eyed about becoming an academic. The Damascus moment came one afternoon, in a laboratory.
“I was demonstrating a practical. Johann Raal, one of the professors responsible for that module, stood alongside me. He said: ‘I can see you have potential. You could become a good researcher. Have you thought of postgraduate studies?’”
Dr Raal was on the cusp of retirement. “There was no-one to teach a module in thermodynamics. I wanted to earn extra money. I landed up in front of a classroom.”
Thus, Deresh’s conversion to academia happened through chance and circumstance. “I’ve had many mentors in my career. One of the most instrumental was Raal. Interestingly, he grew up in Stellenbosch. The family moved north and he studied at the University of Pretoria. He moved to Canada, living there for 30 years. Yet, he was drawn back to South Africa.”
Within the SU fold, over and above his predecessor Wim de Villiers, the two other living ex-rectors – Andreas van Wyk and Chris Brink – have offered mentorship. “They’ve been very supportive. I’ve leaned on both.”
STUDENT SUCCESS
Whatever wisdom he’s gleaned from his predecessors, after four years as the deputy vice-chancellor: learning and teaching, Deresh is tackling the rectorship with aspirations for SU of his own.
“The first is for academic excellence. Ultimately, that is the main project of the institution. From a teaching and learning perspective, the highest priority for a university should be student success and the employability of graduates.
“Student success refers to the efficiency with which students are educated. That entails pass and drop-out rates. Important, too, is equitable student success. For some time, SU has, on aggregate, had a high student-success rate. But, when broken down according to demographics, significant differences emerge. We’re working toward providing holistic wrap-around support for all students. Students don’t struggle just because they’re from disadvantaged backgrounds; those from advantaged backgrounds also struggle.”
“I’VE ALWAYS BEEN DRIVEN BY THE IMPACT THAT I CAN HAVE TO BETTER THOSE AROUND ME, NOW ON A MUCH LARGER SCALE.”
Deresh speaks with the conviction of the convert: “The second goal is our people, our culture, and our processes: we need to create a more humanising, enabling culture in the institution. We need a strong focus on people – not only staff and students, but stakeholders, broadly considered, as well.”
He interrupts his own formidable flow: “I’ve seen we’re challenged by this. We need to ask how to bring people together, how to create cohesion and unity.
“Why do some of our students have these lived experiences? It doesn’t mean people intentionally exclude others, but there’s a certain way things are done here. I always say transformation is broader than just demographics, than just race.
“If you want to be a world-class teaching and learning institution, it’s also about relationships and the emotional intelligence with which you treat students. You can’t be a professor in front of a classroom, believing you can do as you please. We’re pushing to become a student-centred organisation, moving away from the old parent-child relationship to considering what our students’ expectations are.”
Gently, Deresh’s tone intensifies:
“Stellenbosch’s mindset is that the university is brilliant at everything it does. That brings about complacency. If you believe you’re the best, you don’t have room for improvement. Such complacency can be dangerous.
This has played out in student spaces. At a different time in history, certain traditions and practices would have been acceptable. But today they are out of place. There is a strong sense that, because this is how we used to do it, it is the best way to do it. There’s no need to evolve. That’s what happened in some of these incidents that took place in the residences. That’s one of our challenges: how do we shift the mindset?”
PARTNERSHIPS
The third tenet of Deresh’s plan for SU is partnerships and sustainability.
“How do we become a really engaged institution, not just through research partnerships, but also through partnerships with government, with industry, the private sector, and civil society? How do we – in an inter- or transdisciplinary way – advance academic excellence?
“My predecessor focused on donor and philanthropic funding. He was very successful: just over R3 billion raised from those sources over his decade in office. I’m pushing that we increase our third-stream funding, which is research and contract-grants funding, and fifth-stream funding, which is using assets, exploiting infrastructure to generate revenue. At the moment, fourth-stream income is approximately R400 million per annum; fifth-stream income is approximately R300 million per annum. We will aim to raise R3 billion to R4 billion cumulatively per annum from third-, fourth- and fifth-stream income. Then, we will be less reliant on the volatility of the subsidy model.”
In a quieter, reflective tone, Deresh adds: “It’s about creating an institution where the human elements advance both the institution itself and the goal of academic excellence.”
Arriving in Stellenbosch as an inkommer poses a particular human challenge, perhaps worthy of its own lemma in the Woordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal.
“It can be a bit of a culture shock,” Deresh says apologetically. “But, perhaps it wasn’t so drastic for me because I’ve lived and worked outside South Africa, in places not as cosmopolitan as Durban.
“My wife, Prathieka, [Prof. Prathieka Naidoo] a woman in engineering, has had the challenge of fitting into a predominantly male environment.
“Also,” he says, his mouth curling into a smile, “as the spouse of an executive, this also makes life more difficult. For our three daughters, though, it’s been different. At first, they complained about the new environment. But they went to Rhenish and, a week later, everything was perfect. They made friends and integrated. Now, if we go to Durban to visit family, they say: ‘Go without us.’”
At the previous Diwali, Deresh received an invite from a Hindu student organisation, which now exists at SU.
“It’s still quite small, but I was pleasantly surprised to find many students there from different backgrounds and cultures. I can see a shift in the institution.”
When not in his office on Victoria Street, Deresh enjoys “watching sport, walking and hiking; binge-watching movies and TV, especially documentaries. Those things de-stress me.”
But quickly he returns to the high-mindedness that has made him, a buitestander, the thirteenth SU rector.
“I’ve always been driven by the impact that I can have to better those around me, now on a much larger scale than I could as an academic. “But, yes, I miss the laboratory. I miss working with students on a project or writing a paper.”
EIGHT THINGS YOU (PROBABLY) DIDN’T KNOW ABOUT PROF. DERESH RAMJUGERNATH
- His name means “one who is well-behaved” or “a follower of the right path” in Hindi.
- He used to race cars and still considers himself something of a petrolhead (or car enthusiast, if you prefer a gentler term).
- His playlist, when he guested on SU’s student radio station MFM, included Andrea Bocelli, Bryan Adams – and the Songbird Supreme herself, Mariah Carey.
- His favourite book is Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln by Doris Kearns Goodwin, also a favourite of Barack Obama.
- His all-time favourite movie? Gladiator (2000), directed by Ridley Scott.
- He’s a fan of Mediterranean, especially Greek, cuisine.
- He reckons he has a dry sense of humour and a soft spot for British comedy.
- Of all the cities in the world, Paris is his favourite.