Varsity students receive data to complete year
by TINTSWALO BALOYI
JOHANNESBURG – FOR many students at South Africa’s tertiary institutions, remote learning is a challenge as they do not have the means to access online learning material.
This comes as the country is experiencing a surge of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic that has not spared the education sector.
To help students stay on track to successfully complete the 2020 academic year despite not being on campus, the country’s leading mobile operator has partnered with one of the most iconic and long-standing universities within South Africa to keep students connected to higher learning activities.
Vodacom has committed to providing each student with a recurring 30GB data bundle to students at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in Johannesburg.
“We can all agree that success begins with education,” William Mzimba, the Chief Officer for Vodacom Business, said.
“Investing in education and improving connectivity plays a key role in fast-tracking our country into the Fourth Industrial Revolution,” Mzimba added.
Non-Vodacom WITS students have been given the option to purchase a R5 Vodacom subscriber identity module (SIM) card and then register it at any Vodacom-accredited outlet.
As part of the package and agreement with the university, Vodacom agreed to reimburse students for the cost of the SIM card with airtime to the value of R5.
The offer is valid from June 5 on a rolling month- to- month basis and is made up of 10GB any time uniform resource locator (URL) data to access specific university sites for e-learning and home study, and 20GB night owl data, valid between 00h00 and 04h59 daily.
“This partnership with Vodacom provides our students with the data required to continue with their education and to move forward with their studies,” Shirona Patel, Wits spokesperson, said.
– CAJ News
