The University of Technology, Mauritius’ convocation ceremony was held at Octave Wiehe Auditorium, Reduit on Thursday. One of the highlights that really struck me was that on top of the 3 schools already set up, UTM has the ambition of initiating 3 more schools including a School of Medicine and a School of Media. I must say that I am really impressed by UTM’s expansion with respect to the diversity of programmes being offered.

When I joined the then called School of Business Informatics and Software Engineering (SoBISE) in 2002, I had only 2 undergraduate programmes to pick from, Software Engineering and Business Information Systems.

The same school now renamed School of Innovative Technologies and Engineering (SITE), can now boast a variety of courses like Mathematics, Web Technologies, Graphic Design, Telecommunications, Web technologies, Computational Science, Security, networking etc. UTM is also very close to industry, there are even Enterprise Systems courses in collaboration with enterprise solution giants like SAP.

SITE also ensures the student are trained using the latest software used by the industry, SAP, Oracle, .NET, Adobe etc. Same goes for opensource tools, there are modules dedicated to open source technologies, unix programming (freebsd) etc.. Heard SITE students are gaining notoriety with the industry in this respect.

Coming back to the Convocation one of the highlights which I appreciated was when students gave their lecturers a standing ovation. I think it is a very humble but telling reward for their good work.

The one thing I really enjoy the most at the guesthouse, I am staying right now in Stellenbosch, is the view and the nice breakfast we have there. It is served from 0700 to 0900 and you need to climb the stairs to the terrace and you are greeted with a buffet of fresh fruits and juice, cereals, milk, coffee, salads, different types of bread, cheese, jam, butter and marmalade. The lady there kindly asks if you would like to have some bacon and eggs. “Only eggs please”, I would say. Then she would ask how I would like my eggs. I didn’t know how to say “mirroir”, I would say “medium”. She would then smile and go prepare my eggs. I am still wondering if I made a fool of myself.

Anyway everyday I would sit near the terrace and enjoy the view, with some nice breakfast.

I have been to Stellenbosch, South Africa since Monday for research meetings with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR).

The Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in South Africa is one of the leading scientific and technology research, development and implementation organisations in Africa. It undertakes directed research and development for socio-economic growth.

Stellenbosch is a relatively small and calm town with lots of people of european origin who speak Afrikaans, I believe a dialect of dutch. I am staying at Roland’s Uitspan, the place is nice, clean and we get a feast as breakfast.

Need to rush sight now will keep updating the post.