Association News

Earlier this year, IACLEA announced a new international alliance with the Campus & Safety School Training Institute (CASSTI), based in Pretoria, South Africa. Part of this arrangement is to exchange representatives at each organization’s respective conferences this year.

President-Elect John Ojeisekhoba and Vice President of Finance Paul Dean traveled to South Africa from April 20-28 to attend CASSTI’s colloquium, as well as hold meetings with campus public safety professionals in South Africa, to discuss current issues and challenges in the industry.

From April 20-23, Ojeisekhoba and Dean spent time with CASSTI’s Board of Directors, the Tshwane University of Technology’s research team, campus public safety professionals, and high-level administrators. Leadership from other South African universities were also present at some discussions.

Ojeisekhoba and Dean had discussions about campus safety challenges in South Africa and where they’d like to see IACLEA’s help on strategizing short- and long-term solutions. “We asked South African leadership to provide us with a list of their top five to 10 issues and to engage us in further discussions. We determined during our discussions that the African continent faces the same issues we do on our campuses with some distinction—African issues are mixed with sensitive cultural and complex variations,” he added.

From April 24-26, Ojeisekhoba and Dean attended CASSTI’s colloquium in the village of Vhembe, several hours away from Pretoria. There were 50 delegates from across South Africa in attendance, as well as hundreds from 25 other African nations who attended the sessions virtually. Ojeisekhoba gave a presentation on community engagement and on programs related to gender-based violence, in addition to a segment devoted to talking about IACLEA. Dean presented on how his campus, the University of New Hampshire, managed COVID-19 and lessons learned from the pandemic.

Going forward, the two organizations will continue their alliance by bringing CASSTI delegates to IACLEA’s Annual Conference & Exposition in June, as well as plans for IACLEA to deliver a customized training program in South Africa.