“If you’re positioned outside, you will feel like an outsider after a while. There were times when campus newspapers would interview all the residence heads for whatever reason, except Goldfields. Being further away from other residences created an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ idea.”
This is how Pieter Kloppers, Director of the Centre for Student Communities, evocatively remembers his days as the former resident head at Goldfields Residence, which was the first ever residence for students of colour at Stellenbosch University (SU).
In 1978 SU permitted students of colour to register as undergraduate students, provided they could not study their chosen course at an institution for “non-white” students during the apartheid regime.
However, this was hardly a straightforward process for students of colour, explained Dr Leslie Van Rooi, the Senior Director of Social Impact and Transformation, as well as the Goldfields Onder-Primarius during the early 2000’s, when reflecting on the experience that some of his peers and colleagues endured.
Goldfields students are shown selling Huisdans tickets to their peers. The Huisdans is an annual event which many students look forward to attending. PHOTO: Cally Ballack
“At first, every student of colour who wanted to study at Stellenbosch had to get special police clearance. The security police would visit your family and see how you interacted and lived, and to see if you were rowdy or not. Thereafter they would receive a special permit to study at Stellenbosch.”
Naturally, this caused a need for accommodation for students of colour. Kloppers explained that the Gold Fields Mining Company donated the necessary funds to establish a residence for students of colour. And so, Goldfields Residence was formed.
Van Rooi explained that with the Group Areas Act still in place during 1978, Hammanshand Road, situated on the northern end of campus, was one of the few roads whereby SU was able to offer accommodation to students irrespective of their skin colour, as it did not fit into a specific racial area.
Maties bicycles shown in the Goldfields quad. Many SU students, especially those who live off-campus, use these bicycles as a mode of transport to class. PHOTO: Cally Ballack
Goldfields played a pivotal role in the transformation leading up to 1994. The first resident head of Goldfields, Professor Willie Esterhuyse, “was part of secret negotiations which played a huge role in bringing both sides together during and at the end of apartheid.
“The Goldfielders knew about these secret talks because he let them in. They were pretty much, along with the rector at the time, the only external people who knew about the secret negotiations going on at that time,” said Kloppers.
“The beauty of a residentially orientated campus, as is ours, is that you can become part of a community that guides your understanding of life and will aid your skills to navigate through life and help with learning and unlearning.
“If you don’t have the opportunity to share your life with people who have a totally different outlook and experience of life, how will you learn that your experience isn’t the only experience of what is right and wrong within society,” explained Van Rooi.
Goldfields students shown walking to their rooms in the residence after a day of class. PHOTO: Cally Ballack
Kloppers nostalgically explained that “you wonder if South Africa can actually make it when we were driven apart in the eighties, but Goldfields healed my heart”.
“The black and coloured students who stayed at Goldfields at the time were a minority, and many felt like that on campus as well,” said an empathetic Kloppers. But on the northern side of campus they were surrounded by a community of people who understood what it felt like to paint central campus with colour, as they walked upon the white canvassed campus grounds.
Nadia Matulich (21), a current Goldfields resident and final year BCom Economic Science student explained, “One thing I’m proud of Goldfields for is that they always try. Yes, our numbers are small, but we are always trying to innovate change… and make our voices heard.”