BackgroundWhile a number of research studies have endeavoured to understand students with disabilities’ experience in higher education and have recommended ways to effectively support student success, the role of parental support has been neglected. Many studies have been hampered by a limited understanding of students with disabilities and have, in particular, underestimated students’ ‘access to economic, social and cultural forms of capital’ that caring parents provide.ObjectivesThis article seeks to explore students with disabilities’ experiences of parental support in the South African higher education context. The research question guiding this article is: What forms of economic, social and cultural capital do parents and extended families provide to students with disabilities to enable them to succeed in higher education?MethodIn-depth semi-structured individual and focus group interviews were conducted with 17 students with disabilities at two universities of technology. The interview transcripts were thematically analysed with a view to understanding Pierre Bourdieu’s forms of capital that parents provided.ResultsThe study found that while parents are not always able to provide material support, they offered rich and varied forms of social and cultural capital that enabled students with disabilities’ academic success.ConclusionGiven that parental support plays an important role in the success of students with disabilities, and this role changes as these students become more independent, this study recommends the need for universities to also pay more attention to involving parents in the education of the former. It is hoped that putting in place appropriate forms of parental involvement can create a conducive environment for universities to provide inclusive education holistically.

The provision of residence accommodation is a persistent challenge that is faced by universities across the globe. However, suitable accommodation for students with disabilities is an even greater challenge that is exacerbated by the absence of appropriately designed, maintained and managed residences. In particular, the adverse impact on wheelchair users and students whose disabilities require specific design adaptations is acute. This article will focus on the experiences of students with disabilities in university residences. The study on which this article is based employed a phenomenological theoretical approach with 'resilience' as the conceptual framework. The findings reveal that many stressors impacted students with disabilities in university residences and that these stressors potentially hampered their performance. However, these students developed personal attributes and ways of responding to the stressors they encountered, and many devised social networks utilisation to address their challenges and navigate institutional barriers. A particular focus was that embracing diversity is crucial for all operations at universities to counteract the discrimination and stigmatisation that are often experienced by students with disabilities.

Remarking on the importance of managing the existential conflict between work and family responsibilities, emphasis on female academics in a COVID-19 era in Nigeria has received diminutive research attention. The study seeks to address this research gap by interrogating women's views of work-life conflict narrative in a COVID-19 era. The exploratory research design was employed to expand the limit of the research gap and a total of 19 female academics were y recruited for interviews. The NVivo (v.12) qualitative software was employed to identify themes from the data and content analysis used to make sense of the various themes. The paper shows evidence of cultural bias in the recruitment and placement of female academics with social constraints hindering female academic capacity development. The long hours of teaching and consultation depict an indicator of work-life conflict with consequences on family support and emotional care for family and dependents. The need to acquire higher education qualifications on the part of females is also established as a pointer for the provocation of work-life conflict during the COVID-19 pandemic. The significance of lockdown constitutes major constraints for parenting mothers in the areas of combining home front responsibilities with work activities such as teaching, supervision, and the requirement of building a competitive career and research portfolio. The study concludes for a more robust measure in ensuring practical and realistic work-life conflict management strategies are introduced by managers of the University in order to aid the conflict between work and family responsibilities for female academics.

Management development is one of the critical capacity development areas in South Africa, more so in the wake of the vision of transformation of the country. In certain South African Universities, there is a challenge of promoting lecturers to managerial positions without any support of development. This paper reviews this practice particularly in the context of Universities of Technology. The findings reveal that universities in particular need to invest in its management development for purposes of sustainability and continuity.