Don’t hold back, you can make your mark
Shifting focus from politics of past is a stepping stone to reaching for the stars, says a black consciousness astronomist-in-the making
APARTHEID gave many black people an unwarranted inferiority complex. Now, 42 years after the Soweto Uprising, it’s high time we reached for the stars, says upcoming astronomy lecturer Mthokozisi Mdlalose.
The 27-year-old Pietermaritzburg stargazer was this year’s summa cum laude (“with highest honour”) honours degree graduate at the University of Kwazulu-natal in the BSC applied mathematics field.
With Mdlalose having topped his class, he’s now determined to see other young people of colour making their mark in the scientific field and, ultimately, assuming leadership roles that were in the past dominated by white professionals and scientists.
“I want my brothers and sisters to reach for their dreams and determine their own futures.
“Let nothing back,” he said.
Mdlalose is now furthering his studies towards gaining a PHD with a view of becoming a lecturer. He also runs debates for the African Emancipation Student Movement (AFRI-ESM), a black consciousness organisation for young black South Africans, based at the university’s Westville campus. hold you
“It’s about our psychology which impacts our abilities. People who were oppressed during apartheid still carry that element of being inferior, knowingly or unknowingly.
“This is about empowering young people not to see themselves as useless but as people who can become powerful,” he said.
But, Mdlalose added, success is not a magical snap of the fingers.
From an impoverished family, Mdlalose always had a knack for science but laziness often got the better of him.
In Grade 4, a young Mdlalose yearned to see a solar eclipse but didn’t have the required glasses needed to protect his eyes.
“I found an empty chips packet and made the ‘lens’ to view the eclipse,” he said.
A boy with his head in the stars, Mdlalose always loved science but failed his first major test in Grade 10.
“That’s when I realised that I needed to discipline myself, and sit down with my books and study.
“Success is work,” he said.
Years after his wake-up call, Mdlalose scooped the 2016 UKZN Talent Equity and Excellence Scholarship Award, and later attended programmes in America and Canada.
He is studying towards his PHD, conducting further research into the galaxy.
Readying himself for about hard the next black consciousness debate, Mdlalose said that apart from the tragic memories that are associated with Youth Day, the sacrifices made by those protesting school children and how their actions ultimately contributed to freedom in South Africa provided an opportunity to reflect on what went wrong in the past, and what can still be done to correct that.
“And that’s what we as youth have been doing through the #Feesmustfall campaign.
“It’s time we built a new Africa. We have the potential.
“Look at what China and Japan are creating. We can do that here, we have the technology. We just have to pull the focus away from politics.”