An Ode to TUT’s 2026 Magnificent Seven Students

Chancellor’s Awards to the 2026 Top Performing students at TUT – 31 October 2026.

Prof Tinyiko Maluleke, Vice-Chancellor and Principal. Academic Magnificence

A few years ago, we rebranded the Chancellor’s Awards – an event honouring top performing students in each of the seven faculties at TUT – into the Magnificent Seven. Unlike the militarised seven characters in the original film called the magnificent seven from which we borrowed the name; the magnificence of TUT’s magnificent seven lies in their academic tenacity and their sheer love for knowledge.

If it is true that life is a story, then the life stories of the top performing students at the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT) constitute some of the most beautiful that come out of TUT, annually. These are the stories of grit and grime - the stories of the students who, like cream, rise up to the top of the milk bowl, every single year.

And yet theirs are not just the stories of individual students, they are the stories of South African families who nurtured the students. The stories of the 2026 Magnificent Seven belong to students who hail from villages in Qwaqwa, Ga-Mamabolo, Empangeni, Burgersfort, as well as Pretoria itself. If it takes a village to raise a child, then it takes a university of the calibre of TUT to guide that child to the top of the class.

Of all the ceremonies and all the events that we have annually at TUT, there is indeed none as magnificent, none as apt and none as gratifying as the Chancellor’s Excellence Awards to the magnificent seven. Gathered in this room are the students who have embraced that which TUT is about, teaching and learning; these are the students who have been teachable and excellent in their performance.

TUT could not have found better examples of what it means and what it takes to be a successful TUT student. We could not have asked for better ambassadors to the TUT brand than these, our magnificent seven.

And so, we gather here today, just like we do every year, to celebrate, to acknowledge, to marvel at and to be inspired by the academic magnificence of the top performing students in each of the seven faculties at TUT.

The TUT Chancellor’s Awards mark much more than an isolated moment in the TUT academic calendar – it is at the heart of who we are. Our business is to teach and to produce excellent graduates who are ready for the future of work. The magnificent seven are ‘the receipt and the proof of payment’ that demonstrates that TUT is getting the job done. These students are the crème de la crème and the very best of our students.

And yet we know very well, how tough it is being a student at this time. It tough to be young at this time. It’s not just the NSFAS issues that impact on student wellbeing and sometimes on campus stability. There are mental health issues. There are the distractive technological gadgets that keep demanding the attention of students – eating away at focussed study time. There is the world of social media – where many young users present themselves as always happy, always successful, and always beautiful – thus putting a lot of pressure on one another. There is the issue of cyberbullying GBV and other social ills that affect young people at a disproportionate rate.

Indeed, it is tough to be young at a time when the unemployment rate among the youth is the highest it has ever been – currently hovering around 40%.

Tough Times to Be Young

If Nina Simone were still alive, she might have wanted to revise some of the buoyant line in the lyrics of her song, to be young gifted and black. Indeed, we would have encouraged her to change the title of her song from to be young gifted and black, to the title, tough times to be young. The original, Nina Simone version, was a soothing message to the youth of her times. For the youth of our times, we would propose a new version of the song, whose message may sound harsh but it is in fact more realistic.

We at TUT are under no illusions about how tough it is to be young in South Africa today - whether you are black, green, or yellow. It is for this reason that we, at TUT take great care in ensuring that no student can complete a qualification without acquiring fluency in key aspects of Artificial Intelligence. We also take care that no TUT graduate will lack the crosscutting skills of entrepreneurship regardless of their qualification.

And yet, even in these tough times of youth unemployment, young people with acquired skills linked to qualifications have 20 percent more chances of getting or inventing employment than those without skills. Our aim is to ensure that the unemployment rate among TUT graduates must become one of the lowest in the sector.

The cast of the original magnificent seven film was not only military, it was also an all-male team.

Yet if you check the list of the top performing students in 2026, you will find that not one, not two, not three, not four, not five but SIX of them are female! What we have therefore is the magnificent six plus one – six magnificent female students plus one magnificent male student. That is a serious rewriting of history. We are rewriting the story of the magnificent seven all over again. We are rewriting the story of the Tshwane University of Technology students.

From the trends we have seen in the past years, especially in 2026, the future is female.

Congratulations to the 2026 Magnificent Seven

In these tough and difficult times to be young, it gives me immense pride to congratulate the students who rose to the top in each faculty - the recipients of the TUT Chancellor’s Awards – the 2026 Magnificent Seven. To each and every one of them we say: Halaaala!

Mogaleadi Itumeleng Mahlatji - Faculty of Management Sciences.

Anja Smit - Faculty of Science.

Siyabonga Mthethwa - Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment.

Seetja Gloria Kwenaite- Faculty of Humanities.

Maropeng Vanessa Malemela - Faculty of Information and Communication Technology.

Refiloe Patricia Mokoena - Faculty of Economics and Finance.

Molebogeng Marakalla - Faculty of Arts and Design.