Geosciences rock first open day

Fossils, meteors and Mars absorbed top Johannesburg matrics last week in an open day that Wits Geosciences hopes will draw more students to study Geology. “Geoscience companies are banging down my door saying ‘where are your graduates?’” said Senior lecturer Dr Susan Webb. The Exploring Earth open day, held during the university break, was a first for the School of Geosciences. The School recognised a need to expose high school students to earth science before they applied for university, and to attract top performing students. Around 50 students were invited from the top 25 feeder schools in Johannesburg and were split into teams to compete in the five challenges of the day. The first challenge was to match the microscopic image of a rock to its life-sized partner. The wide-eyed students were free to interact with the rocks and minerals, the microscope samples and the machine itself.

“It’s good fun, this,” said Cameron Dry (above right) from St John’s College, who wanted to be a fighter pilot before a vocational training session convinced him otherwise. “I love science. I just never thought I could have a career in it.” On the library lawns, the students used a mallet to hit a metal plate in the geoscience equivalent of a carnival Strongman game.

“The hammer was really heavy,” said Jeppe Girls’ pupil Athena Tsai. A computer collected information about the hit for the students to use in calculating the thickness of the soil below. Next, the students used Google Earth to explore the surface of this planet, and Mars, before sitting down to a free lunch in the Bleloch Geological Museum.

Prof Lew Ashwal headed up the meteorite challenge with an array of space rocks worth around R500 000. He told them meteorites were important because “they’re cool” and “they’re worth a f**k lot of money”. He said people often phoned him, thinking they had found a meteorite. But “nine times out of ten it’s a ‘meteowrong’”.

The last challenge was for pupils to reconstruct a skeleton from loose fossils after briefly studying a complete version.

“Judging by the students’ reactions [today] was a success,” said PhD candidate and associate lecturer Grant Bybee, who had manned the microscope challenge. The winning team members each received a mineral box worth about R300.

Photos: Anina Minnaar

Published on Vuvuzela online, 15 April 2012

e-Tolls hit a long way from home

Wits students driving their own cars to campus will be paying more for the privilege – especially those who live beyond the borders of Braamfontein.

Vuvuzela calculated the average yearly cost for students driving to Wits with an e-tag: Witsies driving from Benoni will spend R1308, R707.88 from Centurion, R777.48 from Roodepoort and R154.92 from Johannesburg North.  Without the e-tag the prices would be about double.

“Well obviously it requires more money for one to get to varsity and back [home], and in the same sense you have less money to spend so it cuts down on where you can drive. Before, I could go home during lunch but now I have to think twice,” said 2^nd year medical student Zain Patel.

But students who rely on public transport will not feel the effects of e-tolling immediately. Taxis and buses are exempt from e-tolling according to the recent budget speech by Pravin Gordhan.

Gordhan had also said the government would subsidise R5.8 billion of Gauteng’s e-toll fees.

“It would be better if petrol was compensated in place of e-tolling”, said Darrel Moodley, 4^th year occupational therapy student.

This comes after Tuesday night’s 28c petrol price increase to a record high of R11.05 per litre.

E-tolls were a core issue raised by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) in a mass action protest march in Braamfontein on Wednesday.

Photo: Jay Caboz

Former Wits SRC president Bafana Nhlapo was also marching and said: “I’m here against e-tolling because it’s going to affect the poor man on the street because it’s going to cause a rise in basic commodities such as food, water and milk. As much as taxes exempt the poor it’s still going to affect the working class.”

Thousands of protesters marched along Johannesburg central business district and many wore bright red t-shirts with slogans condemning labour brokering, the other focus of Cosatu’s protest.

The crowd started to sing and dance, chanting Juju my president, at the sight of suspended ANC youth league president Julius Malema. Wits workers also joined the march to participate in the nationwide protest against what Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi calls “labour ‘breakers’, not labour brokers”.

A memorandum was handed over outside the Gauteng provincial office where Vavi and Malema addressed the crowds.

“We are here to show solidarity with the workers opposing the e-tolling system and labour brokers. Leadership should listen to the masses,” said Malema.

Published in Vuvuzela, 5th Edition, 9 March 2012 & published on Vuvuzela Online 14 March 2012.