By: Phetogo Mabuza- 22 April 2023

Through its Department of Internationalisation (DoI), efforts by Vaal University of Technology (VUT) to help international students transition from their country of origin into the new culture and educational environment of South Africa in order to excel academically, are bearing fruits.

This was evident at the Faculty of Management Sciences’ session of the recent VUT autumn graduations, where Marcia Swart from the Kingdom of eSwatini graduated for her Diploma in Human Resource Management with a cum laude. To add cherry on top, she also received an award for best student in her class of 2022 – something she said she did not see coming.

From humble beginnings, Marcia says she comes from an uneducated blood line, where she is the first person to acquire a higher education and to graduate. Growing up an orphan, she says she had a tough upbringing, and that is why she aspires to be a role model to other young people out there and prove to them that you can achieve anything you put your mind to.

For Marcia, Human Resource Management was never an after-thought – she says she has always had the passion for it, because she wanted to ensure human employability in this age of Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) and the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA) world of work.

“I am proud of myself for being a hardworking, self-driven young woman,” said Marcia, adding that she managed to achieve a cum laude through hard work, discipline, being initiative-taking and self-driven. Despite this achievement, she adds that now more than ever, she is inspired to be a better version of herself in the future.

Her career goals include becoming a human resources development specialist, specialising in content creation for organisations or a human resource consultant ensuring continuous employee development and training in the workplace. In her quest to achieve her goals, she is currently studying towards an Advanced Diploma in Human Resource Management and plans to further until her title changes to Dr.