South Africa’s universities may have embraced the language of gender inclusion, but for many trans and gender diverse students, everyday campus life tells a very different story. In this opinion piece, Tandile Mbatsha asks why policies that promise equality so often fail to deliver it in practice.
South Africa’s Constitution is globally celebrated for its explicit protection of dignity, equality and freedom. For trans and gender diverse people, these rights are not abstract ideals—they are promises of safety, recognition, and full participation in public life.
Yet, on many university campuses, these promises remain frustratingly out of reach.
Over the past decade, universities have made visible strides. Transformation policies have been drafted. Inclusion frameworks have been adopted. Some institutions have even established transformation or equity offices tasked with advancing diversity and social justice.
On paper, it appears as though higher education is moving decisively toward inclusivity.
But paper is not lived reality.
For many trans and gender diverse students, the university remains a site of bargaining, not belonging. The existence of a policy does not guarantee its implementation. A gender-inclusive clause does not automatically translate into safe residences, affirming classrooms, or respectful administrative systems.
Too often, policies gather dust. Celebrated at times of adoption, referenced in annual reports as achievements, but absent in everyday practice.
This disconnect between policy and lived experience is not incidental; it reflects a deeper institutional hesitation. Transformation is frequently approached as a compliance exercise rather than a moral and constitutional imperative. Offices are established, committees convened, and workshops hosted—but without sustained resourcing, accountability, or institutional will, these efforts risk becoming symbolic gestures.
Responsibility for advancing transformation must be clearly located within executive leadership structures, with Vice-Chancellors, Deputy Vice-Chancellors, and senior management held accountable for measurable outcomes, while dedicated transformation and diversity offices are adequately resourced and mandated to coordinate, monitor, and report on implementation across the institution.
Consider the basics of student life. Access to safe and appropriate accommodation remains inconsistent, with many trans and gender diverse students forced to justify their existence in residence placement processes.
Administrative systems often fail to recognise chosen names or gender markers, exposing students to daily misgendering. Healthcare services may lack the capacity—or willingness—to provide gender-affirming care.
In lecture halls, curricula rarely engage meaningfully with gender diversity, reinforcing the invisibility of trans and gender diverse lives in knowledge transfer and production.
These are burdens that cisgender students are seldom required to navigate; trans and gender diverse students are uniquely compelled to expend emotional, administrative, and psychological labour simply to access the same rights, services, and educational opportunities that their peers often take for granted.
These are not marginal issues. They go to the heart of what it means to access education with dignity.
There are, of course, exceptions. Some universities such as Fort Hare University, University of the Witwatersrand, University of Pretoria, University of Cape Town and University of the Western Cape have made tangible progress: introducing gender-neutral facilities, offering support programmes, and building partnerships with civil society organisations.
These examples demonstrate that change is possible. But they also highlight the unevenness of progress across the sector. A student’s access to their constitutional rights should not depend on which campus they attend.
The problem is not a lack of frameworks; it is a lack of institutional courage.
Transformation—particularly in relation to sexual and gender diversity—demands more than incremental adjustments. It requires universities to interrogate the deeply embedded norms that shape their systems: binary thinking, colonial legacies of gender regulation, and classed notions of respectability that determine who is seen as “acceptable.”
Without this critical engagement, transformation risks being reduced to surface-level inclusion that leaves underlying inequalities intact.
Yet, meaningful transformation cannot be understood solely as an institutional project. While universities have a clear responsibility to create affirming and equitable environments, they do not exist outside society. Students, staff, policies, and institutional cultures are shaped by broader social attitudes, religious discourses, family structures, media narratives, and political debates about gender and sexuality.
As such, sustainable transformation requires parallel societal conversations that challenge transphobia, heteronormativity, and rigid gender norms beyond the university gates. Otherwise, there is a risk that campuses become isolated pockets of inclusion—spaces where trans and gender diverse people experience recognition and dignity within institutional boundaries, only to encounter hostility, exclusion, or violence in the communities to which they return.
The challenge, therefore, is not only to transform universities, but to position them as active contributors to wider social transformation.
Decolonising higher education is often framed in terms of curriculum reform or language policy. Yet, the project is incomplete if it does not also confront how gender and sexuality are regulated within institutional spaces. Trans and gender diverse students are not add-ons to transformation; their experiences are to be central to it to move transformation efforts from policy to practice.
What would meaningful change look like?
This would require moving beyond policy commitments to measurable institutional action. Inclusion frameworks must be adequately resourced, implemented, monitored, and evaluated, with clear lines of accountability located within executive leadership, transformation offices, student affairs divisions, and institutional governance structures.
It would require administrative systems that recognise self-determined identities without imposing unnecessary bureaucratic barriers. It would involve mandatory and ongoing training across all levels of the institution—from academic and professional staff to residence personnel, security officers, healthcare practitioners, and cleaning staff—so that inclusion is embedded throughout the university rather than confined to isolated pockets of practice.
It would also demand accessible and competent healthcare services, with universities and their health centres recognising gender-affirming care as an essential component of student wellbeing rather than an optional or specialised service.
Crucially, it would require robust accountability mechanisms. Universities must be willing to measure their progress against clearly defined inclusion and transformation indicators, regularly assess the lived experiences of trans and gender diverse students, and act decisively when gaps are identified.
Responsibility for implementation should rest with executive leadership and institutional management, while accountability should be exercised through university councils, transformation committees, student representative structures, external oversight bodies, and periodic public reporting on transformation outcomes.
Transformation cannot remain a voluntary commitment or aspirational ideal; it must be embedded as a core institutional responsibility, subject to monitoring, evaluation, and consequence when commitments are not met.
There is also a need to move beyond individualised approaches that place the burden on students to navigate hostile systems. Trans and gender diverse students should not have to become advocates, educators, and policy interpreters simply to access their rights. Institutions must take ownership of creating environments where all students can thrive without having to fight for basic recognition.
At its core, this is about dignity.
The Constitution does not promise conditional inclusion. It does not say that rights are subject to administrative convenience or institutional readiness. It affirms that every person is entitled to live and learn with dignity, free from discrimination without distinction.
Universities, as spaces of knowledge and critical inquiry, have a particular responsibility to uphold these values. When they fail to do so, they not only undermine individual students—they weaken the very principles they claim to champion.
The work of transformation is ongoing, complex, and often uncomfortable. But discomfort cannot be an excuse for inaction. The gap between policy and practice is not inevitable; it is a choice.
And now is the time for universities to choose differently.
Tandile Mbatsha is an Education Advocacy Officer at Gender Dynamix, working at the intersection of inclusive education, gender justice, policy and institutional transformation. Their work focuses on advancing the rights and inclusion of trans and gender-diverse learners in educational spaces.
