When Prof Yolanda Jordaan, Head of the Department of Marketing Management, read that occupations in marketing and sales were identified amongst the top 100 national scarce skills in the country, she took action.

One of her actions was sourcing funding opportunities that will assist in developing marketing skills for the job market. One such opportunity arose when the BANKSETA announced its next round of higher education partnerships funding. This BANKSETA funding initiative entails sponsoring the tuition of South African learners requiring this support in order to complete their academic year – specifically aligned to the country’s scarce and critical skills.

The BCom Marketing Management degrees at UP address the scarce skills problem by focusing on the interpretation of customer business needs by means of relationship marketing, through brand-customer relationships. This includes the changes in technology which is addressed by means of digital marketing, mobile marketing, and dealing with user-generated content (eg online reviews, social media posts and blogs). For example, the BCom Marketing Management degree includes two practical modules where students work on real-life marketing problems, as identified by industry partners. Such projects include the management of budgets, project management and implementation of marketing strategies.

Prof Jordaan’s proposal to BANKSETA for its higher education partnerships funding proved to be in line with BANKSETA’s funding drive, and 28 Marketing Management students were awarded bursaries to the value of R130 000 each for the year. The fortunate second- and third-year students received the good news on 3 March 2016 and promised to excel in their marketing studies, to ensure that they will soon contribute their marketing skills to the job market.

The Department of Marketing Management thanks BANKSETA for its involvement and wish these students well in their academic endeavors for the year, as we know that they have one less thing to stress about, namely financing their studies.