Groundhog Day: Student shares his decade-long battle with Unisa

Setumo Motsei has always been ambitious, and career oriented hence his goal to excel in his studies and ultimately secure a bright future.

Motsei never expected that pursuing his dreams in academics will cause him agony and frustration after he had to repeat one subject for almost 10 years.

"I'm not naive, I know there's challenges, but there's a breakthrough after some time. But repeating one subject for almost 10 years is certainly not a challenge, well, in my experience."

Motsei obtained his undergraduate degree at the University of South Africa (Unisa) and then decided to pursue his Honours Degree in Statistic with the same institution, this was in 2012.

Speaking to IOL, Motsei said the subject in question, Research Project in Statistics, has made his life unbearable because of how many times he had to repeat it.

The 36-year-old from Soshanguve, north of Pretoria, said when he started his postgraduate degree, everything seemed promising because he registered for the qualification while he was still left with one module from his undergraduate course.

“I was approved for my honours because I was left with one module, and it was not a major. But I was told that if I fail the module, my honours registration will be revoked, but I passed that module with flying colours and managed to continue with my honours,” he said.

Explaining his dilemma, Motsei said he started experiencing challenges in 2014 after he registered Research Project in Statistics.

His reach title was: A logistic regression analysis application in predicting pharmacy student performance using matric results.

According to him, his problems started with the first supervisor who was allocated by the department.

“I had to work with Professor Edmore Ranganai but he was not helpful. I went back to the department and asked for another supervisor and the head of department, Professor Eeva Rapoo, decided that she will be my supervisor,” he said.

Motsei said working with Professor Rapoo didn’t bear any fruits, instead, it brought him agony.

He accused Rapoo of being unavailable to supervise him and deliberately failing him every time he submitted his final work.

“I would submit my draft work, and she would mark it and write notes where I should implement changes. I would implement the changes as suggested but she would slap me with a fail after submitting the final work.

“I did the subject at least seven or 10 times, I don’t remember not submitting. It was always the same thing, she would suggest changes and then shift the goal posts on the final mark, there was no winning with her.

“Personally, I don’t think she supervised me, she was just marking, making notes and then failing me even after I had used her notes,” he said.

When asked why he did not change supervisors, Motsei said Professor Rapoo was in charge of the department and allocating supervisors and he was not confident that she would act in his interests.

Out of frustration, he approached one of the professors about his issue and the now retired professor escalated the matter and it was pending when the professor left the institution.

“Before she left, she had spoken to another lecturer who is now late and she decided to help me with my case. Somehow the late lecture spoke to another professor outside of Unisa and told him about my case.

“The outside professor used to do external marking for Unisa and the late lecturer took my paper to him to get an unbiased opinion. When the external professor marked my paper, he gave me 72%, that’s when I knew I was being played,” he said.

The professor, who works for one of the academic institutions in Gauteng, requested to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal. He confirmed to IOL that he marked Motsei’s paper after his issue was brought to him by a deceased lecturer from Unisa.

“The lecturer told me that there was rot in department, she said she believes there were efforts to deliberately fail South African students, specifically black students. She was not happy with what was happening and she told me about Motsei and I agreed to evaluate his work.

“I gave Motsei 72%, according to my experience, his work was good enough to be published but because of minor errors, I didn’t give him a distinction,” he said.

Just to get a second opinion, the professor added that he took Motsei’s paper to another professor overseas and the paper was given a good 76%.

“I knew his paper was worth a pass and my colleague confirmed it with the 76%,” he said.

The 72% was a huge contrast compared to the 42% Motsei had received when his paper was taken for external review.

With the marks in hand, Motsei said he confidently emailed the department and included a lot of individuals to show that his paper was reviewed externally and it was worth a pass.

“They didn’t believe me, one of them accused me of marking my own work. I told them the name of the professor who reviewed my work because they knew him. I suggested that they call him and verify but they didn’t. Instead, they took it externally to their preferred person.

“They took it to Dr Malela who used to work at Unisa but left the university. As expected, Dr Malela failed me, he gave me 45%. With everything that has happened, they might have colluded with him to fail me.”

Motsei claims he went to the university’s Ombudsman and his complaint was not addressed to his satisfaction, “they were not helpful, they didn’t even try to resolve my issue.”

Instead, he said one of the professors offered to assist him financially and suggested that he registers for a new module and drops Research Project in Statistics because it had been phased out.

“I rejected the offer because I was afraid that they will still fail me and then turn on me and say they tried to assist me and now the matter is beyond them. I know I’m capable of passing Research Project in Statistics and that’s what I’m fighting for.”

Although the module has been phased out, Motsei explained that he has been allowed to continue with the module because it got phased out after 2014, when he had already registered.

Motsei claims this experience has held him back in his career growth and he wants compensation for the delay.

“I have accumulated almost eight years of uninterrupted experience as a team manager with my undergraduate degree. Had I been deemed competent for my honours degree, I surely would have advanced to a PHD level. For this reason, I feel that I need compensation,” he said.

Motsei's last submission was in 2021.

Outside of Motsei, IOL spoke to another student who preferred to remain anonymous.

The aggrieved student who didn’t mention any names, claims she was unfairly treated by the department regarding the same module after she was not supervised accordingly and ended up settling for lower marks because of frustration.

“I accepted my mark because it took two years to be given this 51%. There were unnecessary delays and I was tired and I settled for what I was given. Now I’m unable to register for my Masters in Statistics because of my low mark,” she said.

To get a response on the allegations, IOL made contact with Dr Majika Jean Claude Malela who is now based at the University of Pretoria and externally moderated Motsei’s work.

Malela dismissed Motsei’s allegations and indicated that he never discussed the project or shared information with any of the supervisors or staff members.

“I respect my job and know the nature and degree of discretion it requires. I believe that students should pass the modules on merit, according to their performance, and knowledge. This will ensure that the country gets competent people who will facilitate proper development,” he said.

Malela went as far as providing IOL with a summary report explaining why he failed Motsei.

“The report has many editorial and grammatical mistakes. The list is very long, that’s the reason why I did not include in this short report,” he said.

Amongst others, Malela said he found inconsistencies in the notations and abbreviations and keywords were not provided.

“Citations were missing. Some statements and claims should be supported by citations to not give the impression that they are your own. Some mathematical expressions are misplaced and the research questions and hypotheses are missing,” he said.

Meanwhile, Unisa confirmed that it was aware of Motsei’s issue, and it has been in correspondence with him since 2019 trying to convince him to re-register for the new module.

The university explained that when a module is phased out, students who were already registered are allowed to complete the module. If it happens that they fail, they are given a year or two before the grace period lapses.

To ensure fair evaluation when marking student’s work, the university said it uses internal and external examiners.

“Moreover, the marking is done using a very clear rubric, with comments also made on the project itself on where the work falls below expectations, and the assessed work is kept at the department and is made available for students to query the results,” the university said in response.

Regarding Motsei’s work being marked externally by a professor who was not assigned by the university and who subsequently gave him 72%, the university said the process of external moderators is governed by university guidelines, therefore a student cannot come with his or her own examiners.

Furthermore, the university said the ombudsman did assist Motsei by recommending that he registers for the new module.

“The ombudsman is independent of the university and will investigate whether the person submitting the complaint has indeed been treated unfairly by the university. There have been cases where the recommendation from the ombudsman has gone against the university and in favour of the student.”

Additionally, the university said Motsei was allocated another supervisor after he expressed his grievances, however, supervision never started because Motsei never reregistered for the module as advised.

Responding on the allegations of discrimination against black South African students, the university said it was not aware of the allegations but it will look into the matter.

“University staff are expected to uphold professional and ethical standards at all times. The university has structures in place for grievances, which students can follow if they believe they have been treated unfairly by university staff.

“Students can escalate complaints to higher levels, such as to Chair of Department, Director of School, Dean of College, or the university management, and the Ombudsman is also there to investigate any complaints,” added the university.

sinenhlanhla.masilela@iol.co.za

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