One is never too old to learn, goes the saying. The 61-year-old Jacobus Carnow and 70-year-old Penny Enarson is proof of this.
They were awarded their doctoral degrees on Wednesday (25 March) in respectively Practical Theology and Community Health at Stellenbosch University's (SU) March graduation ceremony.
Carnow and Enarson were among the 130 graduates who received doctoral degrees at two separate ceremonies in the Endler Hall of SU's Conservatoire.
A total of 234 doctorates were awarded for the academic year 2014 – at the March graduation ceremony as well as in December 2014. SU currently delivers the most doctoral graduates per capita of all South African universities.
Carnow said he had to face especially financial challenges in order to complete his studies. "It was a lonely road. In my study I wanted to focus the attention on the suffering of older black people whose human dignity is often infringed on."
Enarson, originally from Vancouver in Canada, is one of about 20 students and staff members of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences who received doctoral degrees.
For her PhD, Enarson developed a treatment management programme for childhood pneumonia in Malawi. She and her husband, also a medical doctor, worked for several years in Malawi.
In 2001, when Enarson started her research, the country was experiencing very high rates of in-hospital fatalities for childhood pneumonia.
The Faculty of Science awarded 26 doctorates, of which seven in Chemistry and Polymer Science and five in respectively Physics, and Botany and Zoology.
Among them were William Cloete from Steinkopf in the Northern Cape and Benedict Odhiambo of Kenya, who completed their studies in Polymer Sciences and Forestry.
Cloete investigated ways in which membranes used in the purification of water can be kept free of bacteria, while Odhiambo found that the thickness and structure of a tree's bark play the most important role in protecting the tree from fire damage.
A total of 29 doctorates were awarded in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. A doctoral degree in Political Science was awarded posthumously to Marie Elizabeth van Zyl. She died shortly after having passed her degree.
Her life partner received the degree on her behalf.
- Photos 1 & 2: Jacobus Carnow and Penny Enarson
- Photos 3 & 4: Benedict Odhiambo and William Cloete
- Photographers: Anton Jordaan, Justin Alberts and Sonika Lampbrecht
