Students In Free Enterprise (SIFE)

Stenden South Africa is very proud and excited of it’s out-reach initiative, SIFE. Students In Free Enterprise (SIFE) is a non-profit international organization that engages students with their local communities to help uplift them in various economic and business related initiatives. SIFE has over forty countries that take part each year with over forty-two thousand students who participate, making a total of one thousand five hundred active teams.

 

These initiatives are strategically put together by a number of today’s top business leaders who have joined SIFE in the hope of implementing the SIFE slogan of ‘Doing well by doing good’. Participating organizations are required to each form challenges and competitions that are designed for the engagement and participation of students in tertiary institutions with the local community. Each challenge and competition is based upon business and economic related initiatives.

 

Students must harness the business knowledge they have been taught in the classroom and apply it to real world business issues as part of effective and efficient teams. SIFE is challenging and team orientated, it teaches responsibility, motivation, communication and the skill needed for the planning and executing of projects. All of which are needed to become a socially responsible and highly effective business leader.

 

Students who compete in the SIFE challenges and competitions compete against other tertiary institutions in South Africa who are also part of SIFE South Africa. Examples of other participating universities in South Africa are University of Cape Town, Rhodes, University of Johannesburg and Monash. Stenden shall compete against these universities and more to hopefully win in the national competition.

 

SIFE is an initiative taken on by the staff and students of Stenden South Africa, as most will know Stenden South Africa shares the campus among students on grand tour from Netherlands and South African students who reside on the campus all year. This initiative brings both groups of students together as there is an elected board made up of South African students for SIFE. These board members are responsible for tasks such as leading the board on their efforts to spur the growth of SIFE, recruiting other students to join SIFE, gain public awareness of the initiative and gain sponsorship from sponsors all around the country, preparing for the crucial presentations, and collecting and budgeting of funds. On the grand tour side of things SIFE is continued by the hard work of the students studying entrepreneurship. Their work has already begun in the heart of the Port Alfred township (Nemato) by building an entrepreneurship centre for the benefit and growth of the local community.

 

The Executive Board that is serving SIFE Stenden 2011/2012 is as follows:

President: Nolwazi Mashiyane 

Vice President: Mbachi Kamwendo 

Secretary/PR: Ange Ketty 

Finance: Andulela Suka 

Sales and Mareketing: Stephen Frenkel 

Project Director: Rejoice Ngesi 

 

The National Competitions

The SIFE National Competition creates a platform for all the different Universities to present the community work done during the year. They are then judged by the top businessmen of the country and eventually there is one winner that will represent the country in the SIFE World Cup in Malaysia, in October. Although there is only one winner at the end of the day all participants are winners to their beneficiaries, as they have improved their standard of living in one way or another. 

SIFE Stenden did very well in these National Competitions this year. We were placed 3rd in our league. This is a huge achievement for the team, as we were up against the University of Pretoria which are the National Champions for 2010. We also received 1st place in the SIFE criteria for Sustainable Economic Impact (Triple Bottom Line) and we received 2nd in Entrepreneurial Approach. The national competitions have helped us grow as a team we have come out better people. We hope to win the Nationals next year.

 

The Projects

At the moment we focused on 4 projects being:

 

1. The Sakingomso Learning Center which focuses on computer tutorial in the Nemato Township, 

2. Silikamva Bakery which has 10 direct beneficiaries whom are male. The reason we have chosen men as being beneficiaries of this project is that we are changing the perception that society has on the male gender: that they cannot provide for their families. 

3. Ikaya Labantu Arts and Crafts. "Ikaya Labantu", which means home for the people, is a initiative of the Sakingomso Brand. The beneficiaries of this project make arts and crafts and export them to the European market. 

4. Exhabeni Catering and Deco. This project focuses on catering and decoration in the Nemato Township.