Our institutional goals and the SDGs UP’s approach to strategic planning is framed by the approved 15-year long-term
The goals play an anchoring role and demonstrate congruence with the intents of the
strategy (UP 2025), which serves as a blueprint for the University’s role as a national
South African National Development Plan (NDP), the African Union’s Agenda 2063, and
asset, and guides its responses to national, regional, continental, and global challenges
the UN’s SDGs.
and priorities. The implementation of UP 2025 is enabled through a nested approach, with three sequential five-year planning horizons to guide and support the attainment
Mapping our goals to the SDGs
of set aspirations. Within each five-year horizon, annual performance plans identify the
Through this mapping, we see the interconnected nature of the University and society,
more detailed and specific actions needed to realise the overall goals.
and the societal issues to which we respond. The mapping is at the highest level of institutional strategy, showing how sustainable development is hardwired into what we
Our institutional goals thus play a critical role in setting direction and defining how we
do and what we seek to achieve. It also enables the design of step-change activities that
give expression to our purpose and intent to develop people and create the requisite
achieve our purpose and contribute to accelerating achievement of the SDGs in a way
knowledge and solutions that are relevant, of high quality, and impactful as we seek
that is embedded into our core strategy.
to make a difference locally and globally. Articulating our aspirations through the goals allows the entire University community to align its collective efforts towards the
Each goal maps to multiple SDGs, and three of the SDGs cut across all of the goals. This
achievement of these goals.
reflects the complexity of both our institutional goals and the SDGs themselves. Within this complexity, we are able to prioritise the SDGs to which we contribute, either wholly
Within our nested strategic planning approach, we have continued to refine and
or in part. We also create the space and structure for the University community at the
nuance the goals, as we take our complex and evolving landscape, along with our
frontline to design step-change activities to achieve both institutional and global goals,
institutional maturation, into account. For the five-year period 2017 to 2021, the goals
leveraging their areas of strength and capability.
were to: •
enhance student access and successful learning;
•
foster and sustain a transformed, inclusive and equitable University community;
•
optimise resources and institutional sustainability;
•
strengthen the University’s research and international profile; and
•
strengthen the University’s social responsiveness and impact on society.
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Our contribution towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals | 2020 Progress Report
