Meet Our Team

Jenny was appointed by the Minister in 2013 to oversee the establishment of Sol Plaatje University through chairing the five person Interim Council set up for this purpose. She has received honorary awards from both Commonwealth of Learning (CoL) for her significant contribution to distance education and the University of Pretoria for her contribution to education in South Africa. As the person ultimately responsible for OER Africa, she will work closely with the Co-Leaders and the Project Manager profiled below.

Tony is a Programme Specialist at Saide in the area of teacher education, and works with Neil Butcher as a co-leader of OER Africa. He has worked on several projects involving the development of learning materials for schooling and higher education, as well as on research projects for educational bodies in South Africa and internationally. Prior to joining Saide, Tony worked in several leadership roles at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, published extensively and supervised postgraduate students.

Neil is passionate about helping governments, development partners, and educational institutions to reform education systems to enable people and societies to achieve their full human potential. He is based in South Africa and has travelled extensively through the developing world conducting research on educational policy, higher education, TVET, distance education, education management information systems (EMIS), and educational technology for a range of organizations, governments, and donors. Neil contributes to OER Africa as its OER strategist and, together with Tony Lelliott, he leads OER Africa. Neil has been involved in the work of OER Africa since its inception.

Ephraim is a Programme Specialist: Quality Assurance at Saide. Ephraim has supported a number of countries in Southern Africa in developing quality assurance frameworks for both contact and Open and Distance Learning institutions. He brings to OER Africa his wealth of experience in working with African Universities, his work in these institutions involved supporting the enhancement of quality by using OER. This includes finding, adapting and evaluating OER. Ephraim has also supported the development of OER policy in African universities.

Andrew is Institutional Lead at the University of Pretoria and is currently a project manager supporting projects that exploit Open Education Resources (OER) and Technology for Education Ministries, and both Higher and Basic Education institutions. These institutions have been spread around the developing world including West and East Africa, SADC countries India, Oman and the Caribbean.

Monge Tlaka is the Website Manager for OER Africa, Her role involves managing the website development, manages the website technical team and hosting environment.  Monge is also part of th OER Africa Communication Team and produces online marketing materials, website content and keywords for Search Engine Optimizations (SEO).

Sheila Drew is a Programme Specialist – Early Childhood Development with the South African Institute for Distance Education (see www.saide.org.za ). She works as part of the OER Africa team, bringing her expertise in programme and materials design and development for open and online learning. Sheila has worked primarily in teacher education in early childhood care and education (ECCE) and foundation phase. She has co-ordinated a number of large collaborative design projects bringing together a range of education organisations and institutions. Sheila has been one of the South African in-country co-ordinators for the African Storybook Initiative (ASb). ASb aims to increase access to and use of children’s stories in local languages in Africa.

Ashton is a Programme Specialist with Saide, having joined them in October 2022. He works as part of the OER Africa team, bringing his experience in research, capacity building and higher education, with a passion for access and success. Ashton is currently involved in the OER Africa Continuous Professional Development Frameworks project working with the framework for Academics and partner universities.

James Swash is the Senior Website developer for OER Africa. His role involves the technical development and maintenance of the website. James is also involved with the generation and reporting of the website usage.

Mohini is an experienced researcher and digital communications manager for OER Africa. She has conducted research for several OER Africa projects and has published conceptual and applied research on the use of OER in the African higher education sector, OER policy issues, and implementation of UNESCO's Recommendation on OER. Additionally, Mohini coordinates OER Africa's communications, and provides support in maintaining the website and social media accounts.