Prof Paul Prinsloo of the College of Economic and Management Sciences recently became the first academic from Africa to be awarded a fellowship by the European Distance and E-Learning Network (EDEN). Being a fellow of such a network means the organisation acknowledges one’s international contribution to the field. The 2019 fellowships will be presented by Airina Volungevičienė, president of EDEN, during the welcome reception of the Bruges Conference on 16 June this year.

This accolade followed a year of good news for Prinsloo. At the end of 2018, he obtained a B3 National Research Foundation rating. This meant that he moved into the elite group of B-rated researchers who enjoy considerable international recognition by their peers for the high quality and impact of their research outputs. In June last year, Prinsloo received the best paper award at the EDEN conference together with co-authors Dr Sharon Slade (Open University, UK) and Dr Mohammad Khalil (Delft University of Technology). The jury members described the paper as an excellent and courageous contribution, and lauded it for a fresh view on learning analytics.

Prof Paul Prinsloo with co-author Dr Sharon Slade of the Open University UK during the EDEN award ceremony in June 2018

Earlier this year, Prinsloo received more good news in the form of an Irish Research Council grant shared with Prof Su-Ming Khoo from the National University of Ireland, Galway. An amount of €349,346.37 (some R5,6 million) was awarded to them for the B-CAUSE (Building Collaborative Approaches to University Strategies against Exclusion) project. The two academics will be looking specifically at exclusion in Ireland and Africa, and pedagogies for quality higher education and inclusive global citizenship. The project funding commenced on 1 April 2019.

* By Ilze Crous, Communication and Marketing Specialist, College of Economic and Management Sciences