'I’m a teacher at heart,’ says newly appointed professor

The University of Pretoria’s (UP) Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences has appointed Professor Thando Ndarana as a full professor of meteorology at the Department of Geography, Geoinformatics and Meteorology. 

Prof Ndarana, who has been at UP since 2017, says he is delighted about his promotion, which is a culmination of many years of dedication, determination and reinvention. 

“I was happy when I found out, and my mind went back to my parents,” he says. “My mother always thought I would be a scholar.”

Describing what has become a full-circle moment, he added that as a child, he told his father he wanted to become a medical doctor, which was an aspiration of many boys in the township he grew up in. He was born in Mdantsane in the Eastern Cape and later moved to Clermont township, near Durban, as a child.

But his father said: “Hayi kwedini, ndifuna ukuba ubengu gqhira ofundisa abanye oogqhira (I want you to be a doctor who teaches other doctors).”

And encouraging his students to complete their PhDs to become doctors is exactly what Prof Ndarana has been doing at UP over the past nine years. 

“It wasn’t until I became a full professor that I realised I had achieved what my mother and father wanted me to achieve,” he says.

Becoming a professor, especially in meteorology, is not common for a black person who grew up in a township, Prof Ndarana adds.

“In many of our families, there are always these firsts: you’re the first to go to college or get a PhD. In my family, I’m the first to be called ‘professor’. I hope the kids are watching and see that it is possible for them too.”

Prof Ndarana occupied roles outside academia before joining UP. He became a high school mathematics teacher in 1993 and decided to pursue an honours degree at 37, leaving his job at the front of the classroom to become a student.

“I quit my teaching job and decided to go back to school, and sat in class with lecturers – some of them were younger than me,” he says with a laugh.

But to get into the honours programme, he first had to do a bridging course at UP as part of an initiative that sought to get more people with bachelor’s degrees in disciplines such as applied mathematics, statistics, physics or chemistry, and who were from previously disadvantaged backgrounds, into careers in meteorology. 

Once he’d obtained his honours degree, Prof Ndarana went on to work as a junior scientist at the South African Weather Service (SAWS), in 2004. He quickly worked his way up the organisation, becoming a specialist scientist within two years. 

However, his heart was in academia. A chance meeting with Prof Darryn Waugh of Johns Hopkins University while on a holiday research visit to the University of North Carolina in the US led to Prof Ndarana’s master’s and PhD qualifications in Earth and Planetary Sciences under Prof Waugh’s supervision.

Finally, after leaving SAWS and a short stint at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, he joined UP as a senior lecturer, a position he had long wished to hold.

“I had always had my eye on UP,” he says. “I’m a teacher at heart, and I have always wanted to join academia, but it’s very difficult to get a lecturing position because the turnover in academia is very low – especially at UP. People like it here; they stay for a long time.”

As a full professor, Prof Ndarana hopes to play a more prominent role in leadership matters in the faculty. Additionally, his responsibilities to produce papers and supervise graduates, along with his administrative duties, will increase. He will also continue to be a member of various international organisations, such as the International Commission on Dynamic Meteorology and World Meteorological Organization’s Working Group for Predictability and Dynamics Ensemble Forecasting and CLIVAR’s Climate Dynamics Panel. 

Prof Ndarana says he’s grateful for the support he received from his family and friends, with whom he will celebrate his achievement soon.

“It is important to give thanks,” he says.

Read more about Prof Ndarana’s work here.