Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310 65
www.jsaa.ac.za
Reflective practice
Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice:
A Reflective Case Study from South Africa
Thierry M. Luescher*
* Prof. Thierry M. Luescher is Research Director in the Education and Skills Development Research
Programme of the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC), Cape Town, South Africa, and an affiliated
Associate Professor in the School of Higher Education Studies, University of the Free State, Mangaung,
South Africa. Email: tluescher@hsrc.ac.za; thierryluescher@outlook.com
Abstract
Quality enhancement in student affairs is an integral part of professional practice, and its documentation
and reflective evaluation are important in the ongoing professionalisation of student affairs in Africa.
This article proposes a way of conceptualising a reflective scholarship of practice in student affairs in
Africa and method to conduct reflective practice studies to build a relevant knowledge base. Based on
this methodology, it then analyses a student affairs quality enhancement review at a South African
university in detail, showing its conceptualisation and implementation, and reflecting on its outcomes.
The article thus provides evidence of a ‘home-grown’, ‘activist’ quality enhancement review that focuses
on key issues in the South African context and the context of the case university: the professionalisation
of student affairs, the co-curriculum, and social justice models such as participatory parity, universal
design for learning, and student engagement.
Keywords
assessment; higher education; participatory parity; professionalisation; quality assurance; quality
enhancement; reflective practice; scholarship of practice; social justice; student engagement; universal
design for learning
Introduction
Quality assurance and a commitment to the enhancement of quality in student affairs
and services is an integral part of professional practice (Mandew, 2003). While quality
assurance (QA) generally refers to processes “designed to ensure that specific standards
are met and maintained through policies, procedures, monitoring and evaluation”, quality
enhancement (QE) is conceptually different in that it focuses on “deliberate, continuous,
systematic and measurable improvement” and is meant to facilitate a process to “raise the
standards, creating different benchmarks and new standards to be quality assured” (Council
on Higher Education [CHE], 2014, pp. 10–11). Both processes are a kind of assessment,
i.e. “a systematic and critical process that yields information about what programmes,
services, or functions of a student affairs department or division positively contribute to
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
http://www.jsaa.ac.za
mailto:?subject=
mailto:?subject=
66 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
students’ learning and success and which ones should be improved” (Bresciani, Gardner
& Hickmott, 2012, p. 16, in Gansemer-Topf, 2013, p. 26). Unlike the continuous and
day-to-day types of assessment done as part of the professional work of student affairs,
such as needs assessments, participation and satisfaction surveys, and outcomes assessments
(Gansemer-Topf, 2013, p. 27), QA and QE processes provide a macro-level, meta-assessment
of student affairs and services. In the South African context, these processes are particularly
important as part of the ongoing process of professionalisation and the need to ensure that
as higher education further massifies and diversifies, student affairs plays its distinctive role
of focusing on the personal, cognitive and emotional growth and maturation of all students
as well as enhancing students’ attainment of graduate attributes and contributing to student
engagement and success (Kuh, 2009; Ludeman, Osfield, Hildago, Oste & Wang, 2009;
Luescher-Mamashela, Moja & Schreiber, 2013).
In South Africa, a uniform, systematic national approach to QA in higher education was
developed and implemented from the early 2000s. However, only its reconceptualisation
in line with a QE model in the last five years has included a deliberate focus on student
affairs and services (CHE, 2014, 2016). At the institutional level, a number of South African
universities are applying in some functional areas and often for accreditation purposes either
the widely used international system of quality assessment in student affairs developed by
the American Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education (CAS),
or specific assessment tools developed by South African professional councils. A key issue
with using CAS, as with regard to any QA instruments, is “the transferability of systems
established elsewhere in the world” (Harvey & Williams, 2010).
Whereas the national QE process of student affairs and services in South Africa has
been well documented by the CHE (e.g. CHE, 2015), there is little literature available as yet
on institution-level processes of QA/QE in student affairs in South Africa or more widely
across the continent. Annual reports of certain universities, such as Makerere University in
Uganda, suggest that quality assessments of student affairs are taking place (MAK, 2013).
However, documentation specific to student affairs is scarce, and there is almost no evidence
of reflective student affairs scholarship on the topic coming out of Africa. Meanwhile, the
professionalisation of student affairs requires a reflective scholarship (Carpenter & Haber-
Curran, 2013) that critically engages with national- and institutional-level experiences of
QA/QE in student affairs and thus adds to the growing knowledge base of student affairs
in Africa.
This article describes and analyses the conceptualisation and implementation of an
institutional student affairs QE process at a medium-sized public university in South Africa.
The student affairs QE review conducted in the course of 2015 was purposed as means
to enhance the quality of student affairs and services at that university. The university
leadership intended the review to provide evidence of the ‘transformation’ of student affairs
in line with strategic goals of the university. The review should therefore show how projects
and services had been re-conceived over the term of the outgoing dean in line with the
university’s commitments to social justice, reconfigured as co-curricular programmes, and
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 67
were contributing to student engagement, while also producing recommendations for
further improvements to this effect. It thus sought to give effect to Tinto’s maxim:
Effective student support does not arise by chance. It is not solely the result of good
intentions. Rather it requires the development of an intentional, structured, proactive
approach that is coherent, systematic and coordinated in nature. (Tinto, 2014, p. 17)
As a reflection on QE as a student affairs practice at the example of a particular case
university, this article considers first the concept and methodology of a reflective scholarship
of practice for student affairs in Africa. It proposes a definition of a scholarship of practice
in student affairs and a method and way of reporting engagement in reflective practice by
means of a scholarly article. It thus provides a practical proposal for a contextually relevant,
critically reflective scholarship of practice as foundation for the development of theory
grounded in student affairs practice.
The article then introduces the setting and organisation of student affairs and services at
the case university at the time of the review, followed by an outline of the conceptualisation
of the Student Affairs Review, the principles underpinning it, and its methodology and
implementation. In its third part, the outcomes of the review are discussed with reference
to the report of the external review panel, and as part of the final reflections it considers
the social justice dimensions of the review, its conception as ‘activist’ review, as well as other
learnings that can be derived from the review overall.
A Reflective Scholarship of Practice as a Methodology in Student Affairs
Carpenter and Haber-Curran (2013) discuss key principles involved in the development
of scholarly practice in African student affairs to “promote data- and theory-based
intentionality of practice” (p. 1). They argue that scholarly practice requires relevant data
and theory that is meaningful in an African context. Correspondingly, Blumberg (1990)
had argued earlier that scholarly practice requires the intentional development of a body of
knowledge that is useful to practitioners; one that does not claim universality but is focused
on practice itself; one that is specific to the ‘craft’ and yet not esoteric or trivial. Based on
Blumberg’s insightful discussion, a fit-for-purpose scholarship of practice in student affairs
therefore involves a number of elements:
• A scholarship of practice in student affairs deals with problems that are meaningful
to practitioners and that practitioners can experientially relate to; it understands
practice as action, as performance, as a deliberate, skilled way of doing things.
• It studies practice in a scholarly manner that is intentional and part of a process
of learning, academically rigorous and systematic, and that results in trustworthy
accounts, analyses, and interpretations.
• It can address different kinds of practitioner-relevant knowledges: (1) the nature
of the practice and the circumstances it is practised under, and/or (2) matters
of practitioners’ self-understanding and personal skills. It does so by means of
description, analysis, critical reflection, interpretation, and even speculation.
68 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
• It seeks to attain a body of knowledge that enables practitioners to transfer
learning to their own practice reflectively so as to enhance their practice.
• It produces the empirical building blocks towards the development of a theory of
practice that enables scholars to ask yet better questions and reflective practitioners
to understand their practice in ways they have not previously.
As a way of translating this conception of a purposeful scholarship of practice in student
affairs into the format of a reflective practice article, case studies in Morgan’s (2012) book,
Improving the Student Experience, provide a worthwhile template to draw on. Building on
her work, the structure and key components of a reflective practice article could respond to
the following points and questions:
• Contextual information about the higher education system, the institution and
its student body, and the student affairs department where a practice is housed;
• Title and description of the practice, i.e. an intervention, project, initiative,
programme or service;
• Reasons for the practice: Why was this practice developed and adopted? What
was its purpose and objectives? Who was the target group? What outcomes
were envisaged?
• Conceptualisation and implementation of the practice: How was the practice
conceived and developed? What was included/excluded? How was the practice
implemented? What were its costs (including non-costed issues like time)?
How was it managed, monitored and evaluated?
• Reflections on the practice: What were the outcomes in terms of achieving its
purposes? What worked, what did not work, and why? What recommendations
for improvement can be made?
• Reflections on ethics and transferability: What ethical considerations must
be noted in relation to the practice? What is the potential of transferring the
practice to other target groups or implementing it in different institutional and
campus settings?
• Reflections on the account: What is the trustworthiness of this reflective practice
account? What biases may be implicit? How does it contribute to a scholarship of
practice in student affairs? What further research may be required?
It is with this definition of a scholarship of practice and related method in mind that this
article has been developed.
This article draws on three sets of data:
1. Widely accessible documented data on the higher education system and
institution, particularly annual reports, institutional policy documents, and the like;
2. Internal university documents specifically developed for the student affairs review
at the case institution. While these documents are not publicly available (e.g. not
uploaded on the institutional website), they have been distributed internally and
are in no sense ‘classified’ and can be distributed without restriction; and
3. Personal insights into the review process.
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 69
At the time, I was responsible for institutional research at the case university and tasked by
the university leadership and QA directorate to conceptualise and implement the student
affairs QE review together with the leadership and practitioners of student affairs at the
university, as well as other stakeholders. This article is therefore strictly speaking not the
reflection of a student affairs practitioner but that of an institutional researcher-cum-QE
practitioner at the case university.
Student Affairs and Services at the Case University
In the year preceding its student affairs QE review, the case university celebrated 110 years
of existence during which it had become a medium-sized public university operating from
two metropolitan campuses in a provincial capital of South Africa and a smaller campus in
a rural part of the province. Its student body was made up of just over 31 000 registered
students, of which 73% were undergraduate, 22% postgraduate and 5% occasional students;
2 092 were international students, and 2 200 in campus-based residences (and many more
in private off-campus student residences and privately rented accommodation surrounding
the campuses) (UFS, 2014, p. 10). Overall the student body was starting to reflect the
demographic composition of wider South African society.
Having been designated during apartheid as exclusively white, Afrikaans-tuition
university, the institution was amongst the public universities in South Africa to undergo
a set of far-reaching changes, including an ongoing process of language policy review (e.g.
Van der Merwe & Van Reenen, 2016). In the early 1990s, after the removal of restrictions
on access for black students, the institution adopted a dual English/Afrikaans tuition model
and thereafter admitted increasingly larger numbers of black students. In the early 2000s,
the originally white metropolitan campus was merged with two smaller campuses of
historically black universities in a deliberate attempt by the national government to break
with “the geopolitical imagination of apartheid” in the higher education sector (Asmal,
2002, p. 1). By 2014, the racial composition of the student body had changed in such a way
that black students made up 71% and female students 62% of the student body. In contrast,
the vast majority of permanent academic and student affairs staff remained white and male
(DIRAP, 2016, pp. 9–10).
Student support services were delivered primarily by three independent units: Student
Academic Services, the Division of Student Affairs (DSA), and a Centre for Teaching
and Learning. The DSA, headed by a dean of student affairs, reported directly to a vice-
rector/deputy vice-chancellor responsible for academic and student affairs. The DSA was
internally structured into several units and departments, respectively responsible for student
governance, student life and leadership (including student media, arts and culture, and
leadership development), student housing and residence affairs (including eight clusters
of student residences called ‘student life colleges’), student counselling and development,
a unit for students with disabilities, and a unit for careers development (Dean of Student
Affairs, 2014; UFS, 2015, p. 61; see Figure 1).
70 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Student Leadership Development
Student Arts & Culture
Student RAG Community Service
Student Volunteers & Projects
Student Media
Counselling Services
Assessment Services
Development Workshops
Faculty Advising
Crisis & Trauma Response
Inter-Intra-Varsity
Student Life Colleges
Gateway FY College
Student Learning Communities
Student Affairs Bursary Awards
Career Advice Services
Faculty Career Fairs
Career Skills Development
Student Entrepreneurship
Career Network Develpment
C / SRC Elections & Oversight
CEC / IEA / IEC
Student Councils
Constitutions
External Liaison
Student Housing & Placement
Guest & Conference Housing
Housing Services
Student Residence Life
Health & Social Services
Student Development
Housing & Residence Affairs
Student Sport
Student Support Services
Faculty & Institutional Advising
Campus Universal Access
Disability Awareness
Student
Governance
Housing
&
Residence
Affairs
Qwaqwa
Student
Affairs
Students
with
Disabilities
Student Life
&
Leadership
Counselling
&
Development
SA
Management
Forum
Careers
Development
South Campus
Student Affairs
Kovsie
Sport
Protection
Services
Health &
Wellness
DVC: ACADEMIC
DEAN OF STUDENT AFFAIRS
Figure 1: Organisational structure of the DSA
[Source: Dean of Student Affairs, 2014]
Student affairs at the case university was an institutional function operating across the
three campuses, with an emphasis (or rather bias) towards the metropolitan, historically
white campus. Moreover, a few years ago, the university had notionally established eight
student life colleges as clusters of existing on-campus residences and day student houses,
which were meant to act as the delivery sites of the student affairs co-curriculum. However,
in reality the ‘old’ centralised structure of student affairs and service model remained
operationally dominant and responsible for the delivering of services, training and projects
in a traditional centralised ‘service model’ manner, following the functional areas of student
affairs (see Figure 1). The restructuring of student affairs in alignment with the college life
model and a co-curriculation of student affairs were considered ongoing processes.
Conceptualising the Review
Given that the dean of student affairs, who had been put in place in the wake of a widely
publicised racist incident at the university in 2009 (i.e. the ‘Reitz incident’ analysed in detail
in Van der Merwe and Van Reenen, 2016), was leaving the institution by the end of 2014,
an assessment of progress made by the DSA in terms of its transformation was timely.
The DSA strategic plan sought to position its core student life function as part of “the
heartbeat of the transformation process within various student cohorts” (DSA, 2013, p. 6).
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 71
Meanwhile, there was a concern by a new vice-rector responsible for academic and student
affairs that the DSA transformation was strong on claims and weak on evidence. A QE
review would ensure that the rectorate knew exactly what was being handed over to a
new dean due to be appointed in the course of 2015. The institutional QA directorate,
which facilitates the process of quality reviews at the university, was tasked to drive the
conceptualisation and implementation of a student affairs QE review in collaboration with
the DSA and to account for its outcomes to the responsible vice-rector.
The Student Affairs Review was conceived in line with the university’s general
institutional QE framework (DIRAP, 2014), which outlines the rationale and conceptual
and practical principles for QE at the university across its academic core functions. The
same also apply to quality reviews of administrative and support functions of the institution,
and the framework had previously been applied to a review of the university’s library
and information services. Within that broad framework, the Student Affairs Review
methodology followed closely that of the university’s Guidelines for the Institutional Curriculum
Review (DIRAP, 2012). It was therefore based on QE guidelines originally developed for
academic learning programmes. This implied that the co-curricular programmes of the DSA
ought to be comparable to the curricular programmes offered in the faculties.
As starting points, a set of process principles and substantive review principles were
elaborated in collaboration between the university’s QA directorate and the DSA. The six
process principles to guide the operationalisation of the review were: peer review; honesty
and openness; accountability; collegial leadership; programme focus; and knowledge-
based improvement (DIRAP, 2015, p. 5). The ten substantive review principles contained
in the Guidelines for the Student Affairs Review acted as high-level assessment criteria
(DIRAP, 2015). They were more contextual to the specific situation of the university, more
normative and evidently conceptualised to steer the thinking of student affairs practitioners
into key directions.
A key area of assessment was to be the DSA’s contribution to human reconciliation or what
the university called its ‘human project’. Commitments to equity and social justice also
informed principles such as open and comprehensive access (to student affairs programmes)
and the notion of pathways of lived experience. The assessment should consider the extent
to which all students1 have equal access and opportunity to participate, diversity of perspectives in
programmes and achieve programme goals; and therefore that programmes are designed
to serve a cross-section of students that is representative in terms of the demographics of the
student body.
The principle of broader and higher impact focused the assessment not only on questions
of efficiency, effectiveness and value for money, but also prompted the focus on enhancing
student success – both in specific academic terms as well as with respect to a number of
civic graduate attributes – in line with the assessment principle of student engagement. The
1 The listing of relevant demographic characteristics in the Guidelines is extensive and includes: race, gender,
sex, pregnancy, marital status, ethnic or social origin, colour, sexual orientation, age, disability, religion,
conscience, belief, culture, language and birth; as well as academic qualification, discipline, and year
of study.
72 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
question here was to reflect on ways in which student affairs programmes enhance student
engagement, for instance, by means of using ‘high-impact practices’ (HIPs).2
The idea of co-curriculation infused in the QE review was prominent and meant
to provide a way of re-conceptualising student affairs towards strengthening the delivery
of interventions as part of co-curricular programmes in support of fostering graduate
attributes.3 Related principles included co-curricular integrity and alignment with graduate
attributes and the notions of progression and combination. The argument was that the
endpoint of all student affairs restructuring should be a ‘seamless’ co-curriculum (compare
Moja & France, 2015).
The final two substantive principles for the QE review focused respectively on students
and staff. The principles of student-centredness and responsiveness to special needs required
evidence to demonstrate the responsiveness of student affairs programmes to student
interests and needs. The principles of professionalism and quality then spoke to the idea that
the review ought to enhance the professionalism of student affairs practitioners.
Operationalisation
From the perspective of the practitioners involved in the actual review, the most important
part of the Guidelines for the Student Affairs Review were the so-called ‘focus areas’. The
outline of focus areas provided specific instructions for conducting a self-evaluation of all
offerings, and the structure of self-evaluation reports. Firstly, it required that departmental
ad-hoc task teams were constituted to prepare a complete list of all programmes and
activities per department; a list of evidence collected for self-evaluation including existing
policies, strategic or action plans, milestones and goals, monitoring data and other evidence
of performance such as evaluation surveys, student data and evaluations, etc; and a four- to
six-page-long self-evaluation report per programme. In this manner, every department was
required to self-evaluate its offerings using the points and questions listed by focus area (see
Box 1; DIRAP, 2015, pp. 10–11).
Implementing the Review
The pre-review process unfolded with initial meetings in late 2014 between the outgoing
dean of student affairs, the incoming acting dean of student affairs, the vice-rector: academic
and student affairs, and the assistant director for institutional research in the university’s QA
directorate who led the process. During these meetings, subsequent drafts of the Guidelines
for the Student Affairs Review were discussed. Given the ambitiousness of the QE process,
2 Student engagement is defined as “the time and effort students devote to activities that are empirically
linked to desired outcomes of college and what institutions do to induce students to participate in these
activities” (Kuh, 2009, p. 683). It involves aspects of academic engagement and social integration, as well
as social and political engagement (e.g. Pascarella & Terenzini, 2005; Kuh, 2009; Strydom & Mentz, 2010;
Luescher-Mamashela et al., 2015).
3 The graduate attributes proposed in the case university include: (1) scholarship; (2) active glocal citizens;
(3) lifelong learning; (4) inquiry focused and critical; (5) academic and professional competence;
(6) effective knowledge worker; and (7) leaders in communities.
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 73
Box 1: Self-evaluation focus area
Focus 1: Design of the programme
Illustrate how the programme reflects the interests/needs of students.
Describe the purpose, objectives, and strategies of this programme.
Does the programme meet specific requirements of national policy and legislation and/or of
national/international professional associations in this area of Student Affairs (if applicable)?
Compare the purpose and type of programme to the applicable CAS standards and criteria. (This is optional
and must be done separately.)
Is the programme an integral part of the co-curriculum of the UFS? Consider: How do the programme design
and intended outcomes fit into the bigger picture of the co-curriculum and the academic curriculum? Specify
the following:
• Appropriate programme title
• Intended learning outcomes and/or graduate attributes to be fostered
• Target students: numbers, year(s) of study, special constituencies; assess the actual number and
representivity of participants with programme goals
• Articulation with other co-curricular and curricular programmes, e.g. UFS gateway programme;
UFS101; other relevant curricular and co-curricular programmes.
• Methodology of programme delivery
Discuss the effectiveness of the programme in attaining identified objectives/outcomes and attributes:
• To what extent are the identified purpose and objectives met and intended learning outcomes and
graduate attributes attained? What evidence exists to substantiate this or, in other words, how do you
know what you have done well?
• What challenges and obstacles do the department/office face in accomplishing programme objectives?
• What has been accomplished and done well?
• What is needed to achieve objectives and what are your ideas for the future of the programme (especially
in relation to the restructured, student life college-based Student Affairs)?
Explain how the department addresses the issues of:
• Professionalism and quality
• Knowledge-based improvement
Focus 2: Integration in the co-curriculum, college structure, and articulation
Does the programme articulate/integrate with the totality of the co-curriculum? Illustrate how the programme
(and its activities, events) forms part of a coherent co-curriculum that provides for meaningful articulation
with cognate curricular/co-curricular programmes, including those offered by CTL (e.g. UFS 101).
Explain how the programme enables combinations with other programmes and progression towards the
attainment of graduate attributes.
Reflect on the programme’s current institutional location in our office and department; its relation to the
structure of student life colleges; and its relation to other structures in the curricular and co-curricular space.
Reflect on the department’s capacity to offer the programme, including the possibility of upscaling and
enhancing the programme to reach a broader student population and have a higher impact (also see below).
Focus 3: Human reconciliation and student engagement
Demonstrate how the programme acknowledges the importance of human reconciliation by reflecting on:
• The content and strategies of programme delivery in relation to the UFS human project.
• The programme purpose, outcomes and types of assessment/evaluation.
• Integration of human reconciliation in students’ lived experience; pathways of lived experience; diversity
of perspectives (see ‘substantive principles of review’ above).
Does the programme target any specific groups of students? Reflect on the suitability of limiting access to
participation in the programme in terms of:
• Principles of open and comprehensive access; effective provision with broader and higher impact;
responsiveness to student interests and needs (including special needs) (see ‘substantive principles of
review’ above).
• Resource needs (current costs; capacity constraints; costs of a potential upscaling).
Reflect on ways the programme enhances student engagement.
• How does the programme relate to and impact on students’ academic success?
• Does the methodology of programme delivery involve any high-impact practices of student engagement
(such as staff-student interaction; first-year seminars; learning communities; meaningful engagement
with diverse others; etc.)?
• How does it relate to the development of high level graduate competences such as critical thinking skills,
leadership skills, civic skills, diversity and social skills (cf. proposed graduate attributes).
[Source: DIRAP (2015, pp. 10–11]
74 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
it was clear to all that this would be a laborious undertaking. Two staff members – one in
the dean’s office and another in the QA directorate – were assigned full-time to work on
the review and support student affairs unit heads and staff in the process. In addition, a
budget of about R100 000 (USD 8 000) was set aside for the visit of the external panel, to
cover all travel costs as well as honoraria for the panel members. As part of the pre-review
process, the QA directorate made several presentations to the Student Affairs Management
Forum, i.e. a forum of all heads of departments and units in the DSA, and upon invitation,
to the individual departments and units included in the QE review. It was also during
these meetings that some of the issues arising – including fears of retrenchments – could
be addressed.
Almost all student affairs core units were included in the review:
• The Office of the Dean of Student Affairs, including but not limited to the
DSA Secretariat; the Student Affairs Management Forum; the Student Affairs
Research Desk; the student bursary awards; as well as student governance.
• Department of Student Life, which was responsible for the first-year orientation
programme “Gateway”; student leadership development; student arts and
culture; student community service programmes “Receive and Give/RAG”;
student volunteers and projects; student media (including the student-run radio
and TV station); the “No Student Hungry” campaign; and other programmes
and activities.
• Department of Residence Life, including the structures and programmes of the
student life colleges, as well as its peer mentoring programme.
• Department of Health and Wellness, especially including all programmes
related to student health and wellness.
• Student Affairs and Services offered on the two satellite campuses of the
university, including the areas and related units reviewed on the main campus.
• The Unit for Students with Disabilities programmes and Student Counselling
and Development, which also included careers development, asked to be
voluntarily included in this review.
The review excluded programmes in student housing and residence affairs other than those
offered by the Department of Residence Life. It also excluded the departments responsible
for student sport and protection services. Amongst the reasons for this exclusion were
that these departments reported to the vice-rector: operations, rather than via the dean of
student affairs to the vice-rector: student affairs. The structures of student government, such
as the Central Students’ Representative Council (SRC), the campus SRCs, and student
government structures in student residences, faculties and departments were also excluded
and eventually reviewed separately a year later. Overall, the Student Affairs Review was
implemented in a two-phase process that officially started in February 2015 and was
concluded in August of the same year.
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 75
Review Process
The process of evaluation comprised two phases: a self-evaluation of programmes (Phase 1)
conducted by the student affairs practitioners themselves; and an external review involving
a visiting panel of expert peers (Phase 2). The full process is outlined in Figure 2.
Discussions &
Short-Term Response
External Review Report
External Evaluation
Self-Evaluation Reports
Student Affairs Review
Pre-process
Departmental
Self-Evaluation
Identify Programmes,
Study Guidelines,
Data Collection
Improvement Plan Monitoring Plan
Figure 2: Student Affairs review process
[Source: DIRAP, 2015, p. 13]
Phase 1: Self-evaluation
The process of self-review involved that all units formed task teams to evaluate their
programmes in terms of the principles and objectives of the review, using the three focus
areas as specific guidelines and template. In addition, it was initially proposed that the
acting dean of student affairs, in consultation with programme coordinators, would assist
departments in identifying relevant CAS Standards. A CAS standards-related evaluation
exercise parallel to the assessment in line with the focus areas (box 1 above) was meant to
provide a platform for an (international standards-based) critique in addition to the specific
foci of the review. However, most departmental task teams opted not to use the CAS
standards but to only use the internal review guidelines.
The task teams were appointed by the head of each department and comprised
a programme coordinator and others involved in the delivery of a programme (or
intervention, activity, project or service) and, as far as possible, a student leader and a
programme alumnus as a way of incorporating the student voice in the process. Thus,
Phase 1, as a process of self-review, affirmed the professional responsibilities of student affairs
practitioners and enabled them to take ownership of the process and accordingly facilitate
76 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
a trustworthy review. All self-evaluation reports were concluded and submitted to the QA
directorate within three months (by May 2015), following which they were edited and put
into a uniform format to be submitted to the members of the external evaluation panel.
Phase 2: External panel evaluation
The purpose of the external peer review was to provide a holistic, external, expert view of
student affairs provision at the case university, including commendations of good practice
and recommendations for improvement. For this purpose, an external evaluation panel was
constituted which originally comprised of six peers selected to have collectively professional
and/or academic expertise of all the areas of student affairs under review. Additional
appointment criteria were that they needed to have prior assessment experience, a good
understanding of the South African and university-specific context, and be representative
demographically in terms of race and gender.
On the advice of the QA directorate and in consultation with the acting dean and
the Student Affairs Management Forum, the vice-rector appointed: a retired vice-rector
of a South African university as chair of the panel; a director of student affairs of a South
African university; the author of the student affairs ‘bible’ A Guide to Student Services in
South Africa (2003) who at the time was campus director of a university of technology; a
clinical psychologist who was director of a local university’s centre for student support;
an American expert in student affairs and professor of educational leadership working at
a university in California; and the director of QA of an East African flagship university.
Eventually, only the first five were able to participate in the panel. The panel was provided
with summaries of the self-evaluation reports ahead of their site visit. The actual site
visit was conducted over a week in June 2015. During their intense time on campus, the
panel members perused the self-evaluation reports and related evidence in detail, visited
a number of departments, interviewed student affairs staff, students and student leaders, and
had meetings with the university leadership.
Outcomes of the review
The external QE panel concluded its work in August 2015 by submitting a 30-page
report to the QA directorate. Amongst its first set of recommendations was that student
affairs at the university needed to build “a strong and intellectually respected identity”
(External Panel 2015, p. 14) and its discourse, culture and practices had to become part of
the institutional culture and practices (p. 18). The panel proposed that student affairs adopts
a theoretical change-behaviour model for changing the institutional and student culture
of the university (p. 16). For this purpose, not only governance and management changes
would have to be introduced but there was a need to develop an overarching strategic plan
for student affairs aligned to the university’s strategic plan (p. 11), campus-specific strategic
plans, and a better integration of the DSA across all campuses and units (p. 14). The latter
would also help to create a sense of common purpose and belonging across all campuses
and eventually ensure equivalence in facilities, resourcing and service provision across all
campuses (pp. 10–11).
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 77
The co-curriculation of DSA offerings and its interface with the academic curriculum
featured strongly in the report. The panel recommended that the DSA conducts a rigorous
design, conceptualisation, implementation, and assessment of programmes (p. 15) and
ensures that its co-curricular programmes would be informed by a critical pedagogy, that
they would be evidence-based and research-driven. It would need to identify high-impact
practices and have ongoing QE processes (p. 13). In the process, the DSA should reduce the
overall number of student affairs programmes, invest in fewer, stronger, and better designed
programmes (p. 15), and create a deliberate, ‘hard’ interface between the student affairs
co-curriculum and the academic curriculum (p. 13). It argued that such a ‘hard’ interface
would be easy to create with the formal curriculum as regards, for example, Student Affairs
Arts and Culture and the academic departments of fine arts, drama and theatre arts; Student
Affairs Media and the academic Department of Communication Sciences, Student Affairs
Volunteerism and the Directorate for Community Engagement, and so forth. (p. 15)
With regard to the college model, the panel argued that the DSA should not consider
day students as ‘appendages’ to the residence system, but consider the development of a day
students/commuter students’ resource centre and related programmes (informed inter alia by
needs assessment studies) (p. 7). The college model was seen as an opportunity to emphasise
“an academic focus, cultural theme, social justice emphasis, environmental ecological lens,
wellness scope, etc.” in the creation of student learning communities (pp. 5–7).
Finally, with respect to the professionalisation of student affairs, the report argued that
a new, yet to be appointed dean of student affairs should have a doctoral qualification.
Collaborations with research and academic units on campus should be harnessed to
develop programmes and training programmes on building community, anti-racism,
reconciliation, etc. (p. 15). The university’s School of Higher Education Studies, in turn,
was named as the place to develop short learning courses for DSA staff and eventually
professional qualifications focused on student affairs to contribute to the professionalisation
of student affairs at the university and beyond (p. 8).
Final Reflections
In keeping with the purposes of a reflective practice account, a number of matters deserve
deeper consideration and reflection. They include substantive matters related to the
conceptualisation of the QE review, like the way it sought to give effect to notions of social
justice, the pitfall of conceiving a QE process too much in activist terms, and process-
specific matters such as the locus of accountability in the implementation of an institutional
QE review.
Social justice and the QE review
The place of social justice in assessment has received growing attention in scholarly
literature on learning assessment (e.g. McArthur, 2016). In context-specific student affairs
literature, Schreiber (2014, p. 211) has recently proposed participatory parity, universal
design for learning (UDL), and student engagement, as three conceptual models to enhance
student affairs’ contribution to social justice in South Africa.
78 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
She notes that participatory parity involves that student affairs must “create
opportunities for people to participate on an equal footing” and that a transformative,
social justice approach to student affairs must address the “underlying social structures
that [continue to] generate these inequities” (Bozalek & Carolissen, 2014, pp. 15–16, in
Schreiber, 2014, p. 214). This implies that “we need to organise student support services and
programs in such a way that all students have equal opportunity to interact and participate
in them” (Schreiber, 2014, p. 214).
With respect to UDL, Schreiber argues that UDL “affirms students’ diversity and
promotes flexible learning environments as a normative framework to accommodate the
range of individual styles of learning and development”. In the practice of student affairs it
requires “multiple means of representation”, “multiple means of expression”, and “enticing
students to engage in support and development via multiple routes”. UDL thus requires
that student affairs services and programmes “span the range of interactions, modalities,
styles, and media” so as to reach a diversity of students (Schreiber, 2014, p. 215).
Thirdly, the student engagement model implies that student affairs work must become
increasingly “integrated into and articulated with the academic life of the institution”.
Schreiber argues that there is ample evidence in the literature to show that “the goals of
student engagement serve the goals of equity and participation, especially if the engagement
framework is conceptualised beyond the normative and focuses on those specific groups
for whom engagement with and connection to the academic environment is already
a challenge” (Schreiber, 2014, p. 216). Especially groups of students that do not fit the
‘traditional’ student model need to be reached with newly designed institutional strategies
and interventions that promote engagement. The promotion of student engagement in
student affairs thus involves bringing on board previously excluded and marginalised
student groups, creating opportunities for active and collaborative learning, and promoting
learning communities, diverse relationships and affirmative and formative modes of
communication amongst students and between staff and students (Schreiber, 2014, p. 216).
It is evident that the student affairs QE review at the case university did not only
seek to assess progress of DSA programmes and services towards social justice goals.
Rather, by its very conceptualisation and implementation, it sought to actively steer a
reconceptualisation of student affairs at the case university towards social justice models and
goals. Given the university’s history of institutionalised racism, racial and ethnic exclusion,
social justice concerns and particularly redress based on race, gender and sexual orientation,
and overall the integration of human reconciliation in students’ lived experience has been a
key area of the strategic re-direction of the institution since 2009. Participatory parity and
UDL principles of open and comprehensive access, the notion of pathways of lived experience and
the assessment principle that all students should have equal access and opportunity to participate
in programmes and achieve programme goals, and therefore that programmes ought to be
designed to serve a cross-section of students that is representative in terms of the demographics
of the student body, illustrate this point.
Similarly, the assessment principle of diversity of perspectives required reflection in the
process of review on the extent to which a programme was oriented towards introducing
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 79
students to the complexities of living in a diverse, multi-cultural, democratic society, and thus
to learn to think critically. The assessment principle of broader and higher impact focused
the review on questions of participation and student engagement, to move away from
a plethora of expensive boutique offerings (many of which were only accessible to the
small number of on-campus resident students and a legacy of the university’s Afrikaner
institutional culture). A future suite of programme offerings thus ought to comprise a
smaller number of culturally inclusive high-impact programmes/activities offered more cost-
effectively to an upscaled number of students that reflect the diversity in the student body.
The latter was also a recommendation by the external review panel. With all this in mind,
the review thus sought to assess current practice in social justice terms and use social justice
concerns for improvement purposes.
The pitfalls of designing a ‘home-grown’, ‘activist’ review
Along with the intention to enhance the uptake of social justice models and practices
in the DSA, the QE review sought to contribute to professionalisation by emphasising
process principles such as peer review, collegiality, professionalism and evidence-based
improvement. These two aspects of the change orientation may well be seen as a normal
part of the ‘activist’ intervention of enhancement-focused reviews in the student affairs
domain. However, the ‘activist’ nature of the review went beyond this and overall faced
three conceptual problems.
Firstly, the idea that distinct project activities and services should be reviewed as if
they were elements of a co-curricular programme turned out to be ill-conceived. By the time
of the review, the DSA had actually not reconfigured its diverse offerings as co-curricular
programmes. Rather, student affairs had continued to operate in departmental ‘silos’,
each offering a distinct and traditional set of projects, training interventions and services.
In most cases they had not been designed as a co-curriculum that constructively aligns
intended (learning) outcomes with related learning and assessment activities, articulates
with other academic and co-curricular offerings, and articulates in terms of progression
and combination with other offerings (e.g. Biggs & Tang, 2007). If there was a sense of
progression, this was merely within a distinct set of offerings (e.g. in student leadership
development where participation in one offering could require prior participation
in another offering). As the external panel also pointed out, there was little to no
communication and collaboration with the faculties and academic development centre, and
thus no sense of an ‘interface’ between the academic curriculum and what could eventually
become the co-curriculum in student affairs (with the exception of careers development,
gateway, and student governance, which necessarily coordinated some offerings with faculty
structures). Expecting the review to reconceptualise in its self-evaluation what student
affairs did in co-curricular terms and then assess it as if it operated in co-curricular terms,
contradicted the idea of reviewing what is rather than what should be. In this respect, the QA
directorate sought to do what the DSA had failed to achieve since 2009: a comprehensive
redesigning of student affairs in line with social justice models, a new theory of change, and
the co-curriculation thereof.
80 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
A second pitfall manifested in relation to the principle of accountability built into the
process, which it turned out mainly worked bottom-up, but not top down. Too little
emphasis was on the accountability of the university and student affairs leadership as to
what will happen with the outcomes of the review process. One matter could be resolved:
ahead of, and during the review, several student affairs staff expressed the fear that the
review could lead to retrenchments. These fears were allayed in staff meetings of the DSA
and by an address of the vice-rector to the Student Affairs Management Forum in the
course of the review. However, at the end of the review, a lack of accountability of the top
university leadership to the DSA revealed itself in another, major way. When the student
affairs portfolio was shifted unexpectedly to a different vice-rector, the external panel
report and its recommendations were shelved. The new vice-rector did not recognise the
importance of the work done. The focus rather turned to crisis management in the face
of an escalation of student protests at the university in early 2016, as the #FeesMustFall
and #EndOutsourcing campaigns of the SRC and the Free Education Movement turned
violent (Luescher, Loader & Mugume, 2017). Nonetheless, while the review itself did
not result in an explicit improvement and monitoring plan as envisaged in the process
guidelines (see Figure 2 above), the newly appointed dean of student affairs eventually took
many of the external panel recommendations on board when he developed an integrated
strategic plan for the DSA (see DSA, 2016a, 2016b).
Thirdly, the attempt to do a parallel assessment using CAS standards in addition to the
‘home-grown’ assessment based on the internal guidelines and focus areas outlined in the
Guidelines for the Student Affairs Review clearly failed. Student affairs practitioners gave three
reasons for having opted out of doing a CAS-based assessment: workload, lack of training
and support, and relevance. With regard to the first two, staff noted that the compulsory
assessment based on the internal guidelines was already onerous and in addition to normal
workloads. They also argued that using an advanced system like CAS required training and
support, which was not available to them at such short notice. Finally, in terms of relevance,
the argument was that the ‘home-grown’, internal guidelines were clearly highly applicable
to the university context and DSA’s strategic repositioning; meanwhile the contextual
applicability of CAS standards would require an in-depth consideration, which again
needed time and effort that was beyond the review’s timelines. The lesson is that in both
cases, ‘home-grown’ and adapted international review methodologies, adequate resourcing
is required for their successful conceptualisation and implementation, including staff
training, staff time allocation, and finances.
Conclusion
The scholarly documentation of student affairs practices in higher education in Africa is
an important process in its professionalisation. This article has sought to make a two-fold
contribution by conceptualising a reflective scholarship of practice and related method for
producing context-relevant reflective practitioner accounts on student affairs, and then
producing such a reflection at the example of a QE review in a South African university.
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 81
The article describes and reflects on the conceptualisation, operationalisation and
implementation of a ‘home-grown’, ‘activist’ student affairs QE review in a South African
university in detail. It shows how the review sought to focus on key issues in the South
African context and the context of the case university: social justice, the co-curriculation of
student affairs services, and professionalisation. It thus provides a practice-relevant empirical
example of an institutional QE process in student affairs while also reflecting on the pitfalls
that may be encountered along the way.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Mr Vhugala Nthakheni for comments on parts of an earlier version of the
manuscript and for the comments received from the JSAA editor and peer reviewers.
Disclosure of Interests and Funding
This is a personal reflection and my own involvement in the process of the QE review has
been referred to in the article. I have no financial or non-financial interests in this study.
No external funds were provided for the research. I am grateful to the HSRC for availing
the time to conduct this reflection.
References
Asmal, K. (2002). Transformation and Restructuring: A New Institutional Landscape for Higher Education. Pretoria:
Ministry of Education.
Biggs, J. & Tang, C. (2007). Teaching for Quality Learning at University: What the Student Does (3rd ed.).
Berkshire: SRHE and Open UP.
Blumberg, A. (1990). Towards a Scholarship of Practice. Journal of Curriculum and Supervision, 5(3), 236–243.
Bozalek, V. & Carolissen, R. (2014). The potential of critical feminist citizenship frameworks for citizenship
and social justice in higher education. Perspectives in Education, 30(4), 9–18.
Carpenter, D.S. (2001). Student affairs scholarship (re?)considered: Toward a scholarship of practice. Journal
of College Student Development, 42, 301–318.
Carpenter, S. & Haber-Curran, P. (2013). The role of research and scholarship in the professionalisation of
student affairs. Journal of Student Affairs in Africa, 1(1&2), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v1i1-2.20
CHE (Council on Higher Education) (2014). Framework for Institutional Quality Enhancement in the Second
Period of Quality Assurance. Pretoria: Council on Higher Education.
CHE (Council on Higher Education) (2015). Content Analysis of the Baseline Institutional Submissions for
Phase 1 of the Quality Enhancement Project. Pretoria: Council on Higher Education.
CTL (Centre for Teaching and Learning) (2014). Annual Teaching and Learning Report 2014: Moving the
needle towards success. Bloemfontein: UFS CTL.
Dean of Student Affairs (2014). Disrupting the master’s tools, recycling some and crafting our own: Self-assessment
and next steps. Dean of Student Affairs, 2010–2014. (Internal document).
DIRAP (Directorate for Institutional Research and Academic Planning) (2012). Guidelines for the
Institutional Curriculum Review. Bloemfontein: UFS.
DIRAP (Directorate for Institutional Research and Academic Planning) (2014). University of the Free State,
Quality Enhancement Framework. Bloemfontein: UFS.
https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v1i1-2.20
82 Journal of Student Affairs in Africa | Volume 6(2) 2018, 65–83 | 2307-6267 | DOI: 10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
DIRAP (Directorate for Institutional Research and Academic Planning) (2015). Guidelines for the Student
Affairs Review. Bloemfontein: UFS.
DIRAP (Directorate for Institutional Research and Academic Planning) (2016). University of the Free State,
Self-evaluation Report, 2006–2016. Bloemfontein: UFS.
DSA (Division of Student Affairs) (2013). Departmental Annual Reports, 2013. (Internal document).
DSA (Division of Student Affairs) (2016a). DSA Strategy Framework 2017–2022. (Internal document).
Retrieved 9 January 2018 from https://www.ufs.ac.za/docs/librariesprovider43/default-document-
library/dsa-strategy-framework-2017-2022.pdf?sfvrsn=31d3d121_0
DSA (Division of Student Affairs) (2016b). Student Affairs, Strategic Plan for the Period 2017–2022. (Internal
document). Retrieved 9 January 2018 from https://www.ufs.ac.za/docs/librariesprovider43/
student-affairs-documents/student-affairs-strategic-plan-2017---2022.pdf?sfvrsn=c917dc21_0
External Panel (2015). QEP Report UFS Student Affairs. Report on External Quality Enhancement Review
of the Division of Student Affairs, University of the Free State, 21–25 June. (Internal document).
Gansemer-Topf, A.M. (2013). Enhancing the professionalisation of student affairs through assessment.
Journal of Student Affairs in Africa, 1(1&2), 23–32. https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v1i1-2.33
Harvey, L. & Green, D. (1993). Defining Quality. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 18(1),
9–34. https://doi.org/10.1080/0260293930180102
Harvey, L. & Williams, J. (2010). Fifteen Years of Quality in Higher Education. Quality in Higher Education,
16(1), 3–36. https://doi.org/10.1080/13538321003679457
Kuh, G.D. (2009). What student affairs professionals need to know about student engagement. Journal of
College Student Development, 50(6), 683–706. https://doi.org/10.1353/csd.0.0099
Ludeman, R.B., Osfield, K.J., Hildago, E.I., Oste, D. & Wang, H.S. (2009). Student affairs and services in higher
education: Global foundations, issues and best practices. Paris: UNESCO.
Luescher, T.M., Loader, L. & Mugume, T. (2017). #FeesMustFall: An Internet-age Student Movement in
South Africa and the Case of the University of the Free State. Politikon: South African Journal of Political
Studies, 44(2), 231–245. https://doi.org/10.1080/02589346.2016.1238644
Luescher-Mamashela, T.M., Moja, T. & Schreiber, B. (2013). Towards a professionalisation of student affairs
in Africa. Journal of Student Affairs in Africa, 1(1&2), vii–xiii. https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v1i1-2.18
Luescher-Mamashela, T.M., Ssembatya, V., Brooks, E., Lange, R.S., Mugume, T. & Richmond, S. (2015).
Student Engagement and Citizenship Competences in African Universities. In: N. Cloete, P. Maassen
& T. Bailey (Eds.), Knowledge Production and Contradictory Functions in African Higher Education (African
Higher Education Dynamics Series Vol. 1). Cape Town and Maputo: African Minds.
Makerere University (MAK) (2013). Makerere University Self-Assessment Report, October 2013. Kampala:
Makerere University, Directorate of Quality Assurance.
Mandew, M. (2003). A Guide to Student Services in South Africa. Pretoria: CHET.
McArthur, J. (2016). Assessment for social justice: the role of assessment in achieving social justice.
Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 41(7), 967–981. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2
015.1053429
Morgan, M. (2012). Improving the Student Experience: A Practical Guide for Universities and Colleges. London
and New York: Routledge.
Moja, T. & France, M. (2014). Creating seamless connections: Intersecting the social and academic lives of
students. Journal of Student Affairs in Africa, 2(1), 79–82. https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v2i1.55
Pascarella, E.T. & Terenzini, P.T. (2005). How college affects students. San Francisco, CA.: Jossey-Bass Publishers.
Schreiber, B. (2014). The Role of Student Affairs in Promoting Social Justice in South Africa. Journal of
College & Character, 15(4), 211–218. https://doi.org/10.1515/jcc-2014-0026
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
https://www.ufs.ac.za/docs/librariesprovider43/default-document-library/dsa-strategy-framework-2017-2022.pdf?sfvrsn=31d3d121_0
https://www.ufs.ac.za/docs/librariesprovider43/default-document-library/dsa-strategy-framework-2017-2022.pdf?sfvrsn=31d3d121_0
https://www.ufs.ac.za/docs/librariesprovider43/student-affairs-documents/student-affairs-strategic-plan-2017---2022.pdf?sfvrsn=c917dc21_0
https://www.ufs.ac.za/docs/librariesprovider43/student-affairs-documents/student-affairs-strategic-plan-2017---2022.pdf?sfvrsn=c917dc21_0
https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v1i1-2.33
https://doi.org/10.1080/0260293930180102
https://doi.org/10.1080/13538321003679457
https://doi.org/10.1353/csd.0.0099
https://doi.org/10.1080/02589346.2016.1238644
https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v1i1-2.18
https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2015.1053429
https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2015.1053429
https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v2i1.55
https://doi.org/10.1515/jcc-2014-0026
Thierry Luescher: Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Ref lective Case Study … 83
Speckman, M., Mandew, M. & Bodibe, C. (2014). Student Affairs in South Africa. Cape Town, South Africa:
African Minds Publisher.
Strydom, J.F. & Mentz, M. (2010). South African Survey of Student Engagement (SASSE) – Focusing the Student
Experience on Success through Student Engagement. Pretoria: Council on Higher Education (CHE).
Tinto, V. (2014). Tinto’s South Africa lectures. Journal of Student Affairs in Africa, 2(2), 5–28. https://doi.
org/10.14426/jsaa.v2i2.66
UFS (University of the Free State) (2011). University of the Free State Strategic Plan, 2012–2016.
Bloemfontein/Mangaung: UFS.
UFS (University of the Free State) (2014). Integrated Report 2014, University of the Free State. Bloemfontein/
Mangaung: UFS.
Van der Merwe, J.C. & Van Reenen, D. (2016). Transformation and Legitimation in Post-apartheid
Universities: Reading Discourses from ‘Reitz’. Bloemfontein: Sun Press. SDG. https://doi.org/10.188
20/9781920382612
How to cite:
Luescher, T.M. (2018). Quality Enhancement in Student Affairs and Social Justice: A Reflective
Case Study from South Africa. Journal of Student Affairs in Africa, 6(2), 65–83. DOI: 10.24085/
jsaa.v6i2.3310
https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v2i2.66
https://doi.org/10.14426/jsaa.v2i2.66
https://doi.org/10.18820/9781920382612
https://doi.org/10.18820/9781920382612
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310
https://doi.org/10.24085/jsaa.v6i2.3310