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College of Graduate Studies

About the college

Welcome to the newest College at Unisa. It started life as a School of Graduate Studies aimed at supporting master’s and doctoral candidates in the Humanities in 2006. It was successful and so in 2010 it was given a new task in terms of Unisa 2015 Revisited – to increase innovative research by promoting interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary approaches and by providing a supportive and enabling research environment across the whole university. And in 2011 the Unisa School of Graduate Studies was placed in the new Research and Innovation Portfolio and has now come of age as a fully fledged College.

We aim to

  • provide a central hub for master’s and doctoral support within Unisa, South Africa and Africa;
  • nurture a research community, whose primary purpose is to sustain master’s and doctoral researchers within a supportive academic environment;
  • promote and facilitate transdisciplinary (Td) and open,  distance and e-learning (ODeL) research;
  • inculcate an African perspective in research;
  • create a vibrant intellectual space for research innovation, debate and creative thinking;
  • produce research and help master’s and doctoral candidates to publish.

A central platform of the CGS is research methodology. The Department of Interdisciplinary Research has developed a suite of training programmes through workshops, colloquia, video conferences and in virtual research environments. It reaches out to candidates in Unisa’s regional centres, from Gauteng to Akaki in Ethiopia. Many of the offerings are general, but some are tailor-made to fit the precise demands of specific fields of research. We work with other Colleges as well as in partnership with other universities. The CGS has a wide range of national and international networks through its academic staff.     

The CGS is made up of a number of departments and research institutes.

Our College also hosts the prestigious National Research Foundation/Department of Science and Technology South African Research Chair in Development Education.

The CGS is Unisa’s answer to the national need to provide high-calibre researchers for the knowledge economy. Our constituency of about 10 000 master’s and doctoral candidates represents a large slice of the research potential in South African universities. Our ambition is to increase the number of successful graduates from this cohort to ensure our competitiveness among emerging economies.