It's a rarity, but all four honorary doctorates that UCT presents this week will go to leading lights from the same discipline.

The Faculty of Law will award honorary Doctors of Law [LLD, Honoris causa) to Justice Albie Sachs, Justice Dennis Davis, Sir Bob Hepple and Professor Reinhard Zimmermann at its December 13 graduation ceremony.

All are distinguished lawyers, and have used the law to emphasise its intimate relationship with justice, and its capacity to bring people together through critical engagement with each other, says Professor Hugh Corder, dean of law.

"Two of the honorary graduands, Justice Albie Sachs and Judge Dennis Davis, are alumni of the faculty, and very much household names in South Africa."

Sachs, a judge of the Constitutional Court, played a leading role in the constitutional negotiations that led to the birth of a democratic South Africa in the early 1990s. He is renowned as a committed, creative, courageous and outspoken man of the law and the arts, as well as for being one of the first people appointed to the Constitutional Court in 1994.

Lecturer, researcher and commentator, Davis, a judge, of the Cape High Court, writes prolifically across a broad spectrum of the law. As a judge, he has delivered a number of ground-breaking judgements, while at the same time continuing to teach at UCT, always after hours and without material reward. He is probably best known, however, for his pioneering use of television to bring the critical issues of law and justice into homes across the country.

Hepple, emeritus professor at the University of Cambridge, went to the Bar after his law studies at Wits University, and took cases that placed him firmly on the left of the political spectrum. He went into exile in 1963 after the infamous Rivonia Trial - he was one of those arrested - and followed an academic career in England. Since his unbanning in 1990, Hepple has had strong links with the UCT faculty.

"His contributions have enriched the study of labour law, not only at UCT, but more broadly in South Africa," says Corder.

In 1981, Zimmermann was appointed at the remarkably young age of 29 to succeed the legendary Professors Ben Beinart and Johannes Christiaan de Wet as the WP Schreiner Professor of Roman and Comparative Law at UCT.

He left for Regensburg in 1988, but did not lose his interest in South African law, and has played host to generations of young graduates from here. He has also pursued his academic passion, the harmonisation of the two great legal systems of the developed world - the civil law and the common law traditions.

The LLD is also, in part, in recognition of his distinguished published work, notably his indispensable 1990 volume, The Law of Obligations: Roman Foundations of the Civilian Tradition.

Zimmermann currently holds the Chair of Private Law, Roman Law and Comparative Legal History at the Max Planck Institute for Foreign Private and Private International Law in Germany.

"It is entirely fitting that UCT should honour these four lawyers who have in common not only their status at some time as an honorary professor of the Faculty of Law, but also distinguished careers in the pursuit of justice through the law," says Corder.

This week, thousands of students will again file into Jameson Hall to cap their studies. Of these, the Faculty of Commerce will award around 1 204 degrees, including about 452 Bachelor of Business Science and 256 Bachelor of Commerce degrees, as well as 496 diplomas, certificates and postgraduate degrees. Graduates from the Faculty of Engineering & the Built Environment number around 564, of which 437 are undergraduates. The Faculty of Humanities, the largest, will boast around 1 358 graduates. Of these, 746 receive bachelor degrees, and 373 honours, master's and doctoral degrees. Around 475 graduates hail from the Faculty of Health Sciences, including 183 MBChB graduates, 138 with bachelor degrees other than MBChB, and 23 doctorates. The Faculty of Law will have 149 graduates, of which nine will receive diplomas, 106 Bachelor of Law degrees, 33 master's degrees and one doctoral degree. The Faculty of Science graduates just over 600 students, with 354 due to receive bachelor degrees.

To mark the occasion, HIV/AIDS Co-ordination UCT (HAICU) opened a new exhibition in the foyer just outside the Senate Room in Bremner. The photographic exhibition includes comments by staff and students on what Living with HIV at UCT means to them, and on the link between HIV/AIDS and transformation the campus.

Living with HIV at UCT was, of course, one of the themes of HAICU's two-day HIV/AIDS colloquium in November. And that colloquium was the topic under discussion in the Senate Room on December 1, where HAICU officers and Professor Martin Hall, deputy vice-chancellor responsible for HIV policies, reported to Vice-Chancellor and Principal, Professor Njabulo S Ndebele, and other members of the Senior Leadership Group (SLG) on some of the outcomes of the gathering.

As Hall pointed out, the colloquium wasn't designed to provide answers or closure, but rather to talk through issues and perhaps propose a way forward.

There, UCT and HAICU were applauded for their many initiatives to keep HIV/AIDS foremost on everyone's mind on campus. These include, to name but a few, the work done by Student Wellness Services, the Voluntary Counselling and Testing Campaign in September, and HAICU's education workshops on campus and in surrounding communities.

But there were many other talking points at the colloquium. One of these is the inevitable HIV/AIDS fatigue.

"The challenge is to keep issues on HIV/AIDS fresh," said Hall.

Also, debate still rages on whether or not the university should introduce compulsory undergraduate courses on the topic. And while the word "interdisciplinary" gets bandied about freely on campus, it hasn't quite yet become the done thing in HIV/AIDS research. Another loophole was that postgraduate research, the driver for much of the work in the area, more often than not doesn't make it into published form.

Another worry is why so few staff - just 426 over two years - took up the offer of free testing and counselling of the Direct AIDS Intervention programme set up by UCT, or that offered by Discovery Health.

Most of these issues remain unresolved and discussions will continue. But, in the meantime, there are other opportunities for UCT.

One of these, suggested by a hoarse Professor Nicoli Nattrass, director of the AIDS and Society Research Unit, is that UCT take a very public leadership position on the issue.

The family of Prof Graham Jackson of the Department of Chemistry will continue their growing association with UCT this week. At the graduation ceremony of the Faculty of Health Sciences, Jackson will cap two of his offspring - Shaun and Catherine. Big brother Shaun will graduate with a Doctor of Medicine degree (MD) in medicine, for work done over two-and-a-half years at Harvard's Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Centre in Boston in the US. At the moment, he is a paediatrics resident at the Boston Children's Hospital. Youngest daughter Catherine will graduate with an MBChB, and will start a two-year internship at McCord Hospital in Durban in 2007. Middle sibling Tracy, a 2003 MBChB graduate, works as a registrar in Ireland, but will return home to take up an anaesthetics post in Pietermaritzburg. And, lest we forget, mom Marilyn graduated with a social science degree from UCT in 1972, as well as a diploma in employment equity law in 2002.

They were knit together as babes, developed together, matriculated together and studied fine art together. And now, on the eve of their graduation, twin brothers and fine art graduands Hasan and Husain Essop are apart.

Hasan will pull on his hood and gown on December 15, but Husain has other ceremonial dress - the white robes of the Ihram that male pilgrims wear when they undertake the Hajj to Mecca. This is a journey Husain has made with his parents, and he will graduate in absentia, returning to the Mother City in January.

The twins matriculated from Alexander Sinton High School in Athlone, the only school in their neighbourhood that offered art, Hasan says. Besides their physical likeness, art has bound them since early childhood.

"We've always competed," Hasan said. "We drew a lot and we always wanted to see who could do the best work." Creativity is in their genes - identically. Even their parents have problems telling them apart. But Hasan has a giveaway brown mole in his right hand, like a small paint splotch.

"As twins, we don't have a lot of space apart. But we look at life differently. We have different personalities. As we've grown the differences have become more marked." Sometimes, the sameness is downright weird.

"We'll be watching a movie and we'll both move our legs in sync. Or we'll complete each other's sentences." But their visceral likes and dislikes apart, Hasan chose print making as his major and Husain photography.

"At varsity, we've created our own styles and handwriting."

Hasan is hoping his sisters will attend his graduation. At least two of his siblings will be there.

This week's medical graduation will seem like déjà vu to Bev and George Draper. Bev will receive her MMed in Public Health and George his MPhil in Education. Both graduated MBChB from the same University of Pretoria class in 1973 (Bev has the photo to prove it!). But this time they will be capping each other.

After graduating, the couple did their internships at Umtata General Hospital in the Eastern Cape, with some relief to mission hospitals there, and then both worked at Moroka Hospital in the Free State and at Manguzi Hospital in KwaZulu-Natal.

George went on to complete two more degrees and Bev was a general practitioner in KwaZulu-Natal for 22 years before venturing into the public health arena.

"The best part was the relationship-building with patients and the families," Bev added. She completed diplomas in counselling and therapy and did a good deal of family counselling on top of her career as a GP.

Married during their fifth year of study ("Our budget was R100 a month!"), Bev says "it was the best time ever".

"It was easier to be married to a fellow doctor. That has always been one of the strengths of our marriage." George also has an MSc in Mother & Child Health (London University) and is a Fellow of the College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.

"For us, medicine has been a calling rather than a career. It is deeply embedded in our Christian faith to make a difference through our professions." The couple has three children: Kirstin who has a BSc in Nursing from Wits; Cathi who has an MSocSci and a PhD in public health from UCT; and Matthew with a BA Hons and a Diploma in Education from UCT.

Special guests at their post-graduation festivities will be their two grandsons, Joel (4) and Timothy (2), and a VIP: 90-year old "Omie", Jackie Kaiser, who will be making the trip south from Pretoria.

Sixty-four years after receiving her BA degree, Rachel Roditi (nee Alhadeff) will be back at graduation, this time to applaud as her grandson is capped by his father, Prof Gerald Nurick. "What with my daughter's Denise's long history at UCT [MBChB 1977; MMed, and MBA, 2003], and then my various grandchildren, I have kept up with what is happening at UCT, but it is always a pleasure to be back on campus, and this year it is a special delight as it is a father and son affair," says Roditi. Saul Nurick graduates in property studies, an interesting contrast, he says, to his undergraduate degree, a BCom in information systems. "I think it has been an advantage to have a father on the staff; it has certainly made me much more aware of the ins and outs of the university."

On the lookout for that special graduation memento, other than the degree certificate? Then search no further than the bottles of graduation wine marketed by RAG (Remember And Give), which raises funds for the Students' Health and Welfare Centres Organisation (SHAWCO). The wine sales contribute some R60 000 to SHAWCO's many projects each year. It's a memorable gift in more ways than one. The bottle itself is a keepsake as the label lists the name of each and every December graduate. (Each sale comes with a magnifying glass.) The wine, by the way, is produced by the award-winning Hoopenberg Wine Estate. The red wine is a 2003 Dry Red Blend (shiraz-merlot), and the white is a 2004 chenin blanc. The sparkling wine and non-alcoholic beverages come from the much-acclaimed Oranjerivier Wynkelder. The wine will be sold in the Leslie Social Sciences Building foyer during the graduation week. For more information on the wine, contact RAG at uctrag.gradwine@gmail.com, or visit http://:www.uctrag.com.

Learning new languages

Last week, the Multilingualism Education Project (MEP) held a graduation ceremony for 34 staff members who had completed the isiXhosa Communications Skills Course. All are from the Centre for Higher Education Development (CHED) and UCT Libraries. This year's course, made up of 12 sessions, was the first and served as a pilot run for MEP. Four isiXhosa courses will be held in the first semester of 2007, and another four in the second. Speaking at the ceremony, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Prof Martin Hall said that he hoped that by the introduction of isiXhosa courses for staff "we will turn into a thoroughly African university and therefore a world university".

It's all the way for 2006 medics

Corks catapulted skywards and champagne arced across the Barnard Fuller quad as the MBChB results were announced recently. There was good reason for celebration: a 98% pass rate among the 183 candidates, Professor Marian Jacobs, dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences, announced from the balcony.

Debbie Rencken won the University Gold Medal for the most distinguished MBChB student, graduating with honours. Twenty-five students from the MBChB class are graduating with first-class honours, a new record for the faculty.

Other results were: BSc in Audiology, eight; BSc in Speech Language Pathology, 17 (two with distinctions); BSc in Occupational Therapy, 51 (two with distinctions); BSc in Physiotherapy, 62 (four with distinctions).

The occupational therapy and audiology classes recorded a 100% pass rate. Tessa Eidelman won the Occupational Therapy Gold Medal.

(Thanks go to Dr Tony Behrman and Dr Graham Howarth from the Medical Protection Society who sponsored the bash.)

Monique Whitaker, who is graduating with her master's degree in philosophy, will be capped by her father, Professor Richard Whitaker of the School of Languages and Literatures.

And not for the first - or second - time.

Prof Whitaker, who at the time of writing had gone to deliver a paper at Brown University in the US, capped his daughter when she graduated with a BA degree, and then again when she completed her honours.

He did the same double duty for Monique's brother, Joseph.

Quite the old hand. But this week will be an exceptionally busy time for him.

He's also going to be capping doctoral graduate Anthony Roberts, husband to Monique's step-sister, Erin. Erin, too, is getting her teaching diploma and her MSc in zoology this week.

"So, there are lots of graduation celebrations in the family this year," says Monique.

Although she vowed not to follow her father into academia, Monique said she had a change of heart.

"I've started my PhD in philosophy here at UCT, though I'm applying to overseas universities to possibly study in the US or Britain later next year."

That might just mean an international capping by an old hand at the job.

Dr Moragh Paxton, of the Language Development Group in the Centre for Higher Education Development (CHED), will cap her daughter, Juliet, on December 11, one of 183 MBChB graduands.

Paxton's son, Craig, graduated with a chemical engineering degree in 1998. He returned to UCT to complete his Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) in 2002.

Craig completed that certificate alongside sister Kirsty, who had graduated the previous year with a BSc in environmental and geographical sciences. Both got distinctions for the PGCE.

But Craig got more than a certificate: in the PGCE year he met Michelle Lawrence (BBusSci), his future wife.

Craig is now teaching science and maths at Pinelands High and is off to do a master's in education next year, probably in Canada.

Kirsty is arts and crafts director at the Two Oceans Aquarium.

Is there some relief in sight for Paxton?

"Yes, it's been 15 years of higher education for our children, but it's been fun. There's the empty nest syndrome next year as Juliet goes off to Pietermartizburg to do her internship."