The Academic Development Programme (ADP) has its roots in the Academic Support Programme which during the 1980s facilitated access and offered academic and psychosocial support to students entering UCT despite repressive Apartheid legislation. An important belief underpinning the work of ADP through the decades has been that most students experience difficulties at university not because they themselves are deficient in some way, but because of major structural inequalities that persist in South African educational systems and society at large. In 2018 ADP retains its focus on providing access to higher education and strengthening students’ chances of success. Our preferred way of providing educational support is to work in close partnership with the faculties and to embed developmental materials and activities in credit-bearing courses and carefully constructed curricula. We also provide educational support to postgraduate students and UCT staff.

Faculty units: Humanities EDU, Commerce EDU, Science EDP, Health Sciences EDU, Law ECP and Aspect (in Engineering)

Cross-Faculty units: Numeracy Centre, Language Development Group