The National Research Foundation (NRF) has awarded University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) Distinguished Professor Jill Adler the lifetime achiever award at the 2023 NRF Awards ceremony held on August 31 in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal.

Introduced to the NRF Awards in 2004, the lifetime achiever award recognises an individual who has demonstrably made extraordinary contributions to the development of science in and for South Africa over an extended period of time.

These contributions must be of international standard and impact.

Adler received her award in person and expressed her gratitude for the special recognition.

“This award for me gives recognition to the importance of educational research and educational research that is grounded in the realities of our mathematics classrooms. It gives meaning to the NRF vision for science and service of society,” she said.

A Distinguished Professor in the Wits School of Education, Adler was born and raised in Johannesburg. She completed a BSc in Mathematics and Psychology at Wits in 1972 and her Secondary Teachers Diploma at the University of Cape Town in 1973 before taking up a teaching post at Harold Cressy High School in Cape Town.

In 1977, she returned to Johannesburg and joined the South African Committee for Higher Education Trust, an educational nongovernmental organisation (NGO) concerned with enriching the quality of education of those disadvantaged in apartheid South Africa, where she first taught O-level mathematics to youth who were out of school following the Soweto uprising in 1976.

Her work at the NGO over the next ten years enabled her to further her social justice advocacy, seeking to address the educational inequalities in South Africa by improving mathematics education through the development and evaluation of distance education courses.

At the same time, she studied for her MEd at Wits, graduating cum laude in 1985. In 1987 she moved into academia, lecturing in the Department of Professional Studies at the Johannesburg College of Education for two years before moving to the Education Department at Wits where she worked variously as a lecturer, head of department, professor, as well as the SARChI Chair of Mathematics Education 2010 to 2019.

She holds an A1-rating from the NRF.

Adler completed her PhD in 1996 with a thesis that looked at the dynamics of teaching and learning mathematics in multilingual classrooms, specifically examining secondary school teachers’ knowledge in this context. This was later published as a book as well as a range of papers in peer-reviewed journals. This seminal research is indicated to have had lasting impact on the broader field of mathematics education, providing insights for educators and policymakers.

Her theoretical and practice-based innovations are posited to address two fundamental research problems: the complexities and challenges of teaching and learning mathematics in multilingual classrooms, and the enhancement of professional education for mathematics teachers.

Adler’s initiatives were made possible by her accelerated appointment as the Distinguished Sentrachem Professor of Mathematics Education in 1997. These programmes were designed to empower the research community to effectively address the challenges at hand.

Among these initiatives was the establishment of a doctoral programme. 

Working alongside a dedicated cohort of students, she spearheaded efforts to position mathematics education as a robust research domain within the university, and more broadly in the country.

In 2005, Adler established and, for a period, led the Marang Centre for Mathematics and Science Education at Wits, which became a hub for advanced studies and innovative research.

Between 2010 and 2019, as the DSI-NRF SARChI Research and Development Chair in Mathematics Education at Wits, she directed a large professional development project, reaching over 200 secondary mathematics teachers and many learners across 80 schools in Gauteng, and researched its impact together with a large research team of Doctoral and post-Doctoral Fellows.

Adler is an Honorary Professor at Oxford University and University College London, both in the UK. She has published more than 60 peer-reviewed articles and four books; co-edited two special journal issues and contributed 50 book chapters, achieving more than 7 000 citations and an H-index of 37.

She has served on various editorial boards for leading publications such as the Journal for Research in Mathematics Education and Educational Studies in Mathematics.

Over the course of her 45-year career in teaching and academia, she has garnered numerous accolades in recognition of her contributions to education.

The NRF has been one of the most important institutions throughout Adler’s academic journey, she said at the awards ceremony.