Mr Thabiso Godfrey Monyane, a Lecturer at Built Environment in the Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology made CUT and his faculty proud when he won and received the ‘Pentad Best Academic Paper Award’ at the 7th Annual Quantity Surveying Conference that was held at CSIR in Pretoria on 22 and 23 September 2014.  

Asked what inspired him to choose the topic, Thabiso said that the theme caught his attention and interest and he started reading a lot about it. “It is the buzz word in the global construction industry, so we have to keep abreast with what our colleagues abroad are doing.” According to Thabiso, winning the ‘Pentad Best Academic Paper Award’ means that together with his department, they will be engaged in continuous research that addresses the future of Quantity Surveying Industry and cascade the information down to their students. The title of his paper was, Exploration of Building Information Modelling (BIM) concept and its effect on Quantity Surveying Profession in South Africa: Case of FS Province. “BIM is the new way of doing things in the field of Quantity Surveying in order to enhance the service delivery and improve the construction industry at large.” He further stated that construction in the Public and Private sectors will benefit massively if they start delivering projects using BIM. When asked about his opinion on the current state of Quantity Surveying in South Africa, Godfrey said that it differs from province to province. “Unfortunately in the Free State, the Public sector does not fully utilise the profession but am very excited to win this awards as this means getting recognition from the highest professional body in the country! I would also like to acknowledge my mentor and HOD Dr Emuze, Dr Aiyetan, Dr Alex Opoku, a visiting Dr from UK and my supervisor Dr Ramabodu from UFS for their positive contribution, we did it!” 

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Victorious and excited after receiving the award is Thabiso Godfrey Monyane (Centre), flanked by his BTech students: Javia van der Westhuizen (left) and Oumaki Masiu who accompanied him to the conference.