“A proposal for undergraduate curriculum reform in South Africa: The case for a flexible curriculum structure” (CHE, 2013) suggests a number of scenario (models) in order to increase the number of graduates nationally. For the past 20 years South African higher education institutions were expected to start implementing a number of new policies and to align their internal functions and structures more optimally towards increased access, student throughput and quality teaching and learning, amongst other policy indicators. Since 1994, the SA government has been steering a radical transformation and restructuring of higher education, which kicked off with the White Paper on HE transformation (1995), the latter which formally culminated in the Higher Education Act 101 of 1997. Policies are generally developed in response to challenges, problems or inadequate progress in respect of nationally identified strategic goals or targets. Some policies are geared at national quality enhancement, in the process, establishing new national structures with dedicated terms of reference and responsibilities. Policies are thus created to bring about desirable change and are generally regarded as strong symbolic indicators of national intent (Bunting, 2008; Bunting, 2004). This paper reports on a sample of national and institutional policies and the directives stemming from them. The pertinent emphasis on an increase in the participation and eventually the academic success of undergraduate students in Science programmes is linked to insights brought about by increasingly improved National Senior Certificate (NSC) results, especially over the last decade. The quantitative investigation compares the academic performance of 1563 main stream first year degree students with 2110 extended degree students in seven fundamental science modules at the University of Johannesburg. Mean values were compared and regression provided predictive value of the different modules on performance. The enquiry culminates in speculation on the implications that the above mentioned Flexible Curriculum Structure might bring about and the dataset investigate flexible curriculum in practice at the University of Johannesburg.

We present new analytical data of major and trace elements for the geological MPI‐DING glasses KL2‐G, ML3B‐G, StHs6/80‐G, GOR128‐G, GOR132‐G, BM90/21‐G, T1‐G, and ATHO‐G. Different analytical methods were used to obtain a large spectrum of major and trace element data, in particular, EPMA, SIMS, LA‐ICPMS, and isotope dilution by TIMS and ICPMS. Altogether, more than 60 qualified geochemical laboratories worldwide contributed to the analyses, allowing us to present new reference and information values and their uncertainties (at 95% confidence level) for up to 74 elements. We complied with the recommendations for the certification of geological reference materials by the International Association of Geoanalysts (IAG). The reference values were derived from the results of 16 independent techniques, including definitive (isotope dilution) and comparative bulk (e.g., INAA, ICPMS, SSMS) and microanalytical (e.g., LA‐ICPMS, SIMS, EPMA) methods. Agreement between two or more independent methods and the use of definitive methods provided traceability to the fullest extent possible. We also present new and recently published data for the isotopic compositions of H, B, Li, O, Ca, Sr, Nd, Hf, and Pb. The results were mainly obtained by high‐precision bulk techniques, such as TIMS and MC‐ICPMS. In addition, LA‐ICPMS and SIMS isotope data of B, Li, and Pb are presented.