Top Academic Achievers in the Era of Online Learning at MANCOSA

Two MANCOSA students share their experiences of online learning and their journey to becoming top academic achievers.

Gerhard Harman, 27, is presently employed as a SAICA Article Clerk, a position that he obtained as a result of his studies at MANCOSA. 

He has always dreamt of studying Financial Accounting and becoming a Chartered Accountant since his first accounting class in school. Due to circumstances beyond his control, he was unable to study after finishing school. He started working in the retail business, but he never lost his passion for accounting. He finally got a job in an accounting firm and after a few years, he decided to embark on an academic journey. He enrolled at MANCOSA and found this was the opportunity he was waiting for his whole life.

“My online learning journey with MANCOSA has been great. MANCOSA has put a tremendous amount of work and effort into ensuring that all their students’ needs are taken care of, while at the same ensuring successful communication of all information pertaining to the subjects at hand.

“During a difficult year, where in-person learning was not possible, MANCOSA ensured that the success of their students’ academic year remained a top priority and acted swiftly to put alternatives in place to make the successful completion of our modules possible,” said Harman.

Dayalin Pillay who completed a Bachelor of Commerce in Information Technology at MANCOSA and now works for Telkom, said he was very honoured and proud to have done so well in these challenging times. Pillay said that 2020 was a tough year because of Covid-19 and he also lost his mum. He said he however realised that one should not give up because of losing someone and that it is best instead to do something that would have made that person proud of you. That something for him was doing his best in his studies.

According to Pillay, online learning is a huge change from sitting in a class with a lecturer and fellow students. He said that one has to be more disciplined in order not to be distracted during online learning. For him, working while studying made it more difficult, as he only had time to catch up on weekends or after hours.

Pillay said his secret in achieving such good results is due to hard work and determination. He also worked on past year papers and participated in study groups which are a great way to learn and share knowledge.

By Dr Claudine Hingston and Mrs Elisabeth Kanani