The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) South Africa Section together with the University of KwaZulu-Natal recently hosted a talk titled IEEE – Opportunities and Benefits.

The talk was held at the Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering Building on the Howard College campus, with speaker of the day Dr Albert Lysko, IEEE Chair, South Africa Section. Albert is also a Principal Researcher, CSIR Pretoria and South African Representative in European Union COST Action on “Inclusive Radio Communication Networks for 5G and beyond”.

Mr Dauda Ayanda Vice-Chair, IEEE South Africa Section (on behalf of IEEE-HKN UKZN Chapter) said the talk promotes the IEEE Student branch chapter at UKZN and how to sustain it through various benefits to the students and the community. ‘This is the first IEEE student talk at UKZN that focused on promoting Student Chapters. Several other programme/activities will be coming up towards promoting students’ research and professional skills that will be beneficial to the community and industry,’ said Ayanda.

The talk also focused on how to organise professional activities among Engineering students and how to promote technical and leadership skills via pre/post-education and community development service. It also included networking through collaboration, IEEE skills competition and sharing of ideas, research support via top impact journals, conferences and distinguished lectures.

The IEEE Open Day comprised of approximately 40 participants (students) from both Disciplines of Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering and Mechanical Engineering. ‘The lecture was the maiden edition of IEEE Student Chapter talk at UKZN. Part of the talk was about IEEE and what it offers, and about opportunities to sustain an IEEE Unit (Student Branch Chapter) at UKZN,’ said Ayanda.

Words: Manqoba Hadebe