SUS1501/101/3/2020

Tutorial Letter 101/3/2020

Sustainability and Greed

SUS1501

Semesters 1 and 2

Department Applied Management

IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Please register on myUnisa, activate your myLife email address and
make sure that you have regular access to the myUnisa module
website, SUS1501-2020-S1/S2, as well as your group website.

Note: This is a fully online module and therefore it is only available on myUnisa.

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 CONTENTS

Page

1 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................... 3
1.1 Getting started … .......................................................................................................................... 3
2 PURPOSE OF SUS1501 .............................................................................................................. 4
3 LECTURER AND CONTACT DETAILS ....................................................................................... 4
3.1 Lecturer ........................................................................................................................................ 4
3.2 Teaching Assistants ...................................................................................................................... 4
3.3 Department ................................................................................................................................... 4
3.3 University ...................................................................................................................................... 5
4 RESOURCES ............................................................................................................................... 5
4.1 Joining myUnisa ........................................................................................................................... 5
4.2 myLife email account .................................................................................................................... 5
4.3 Library services and resources ..................................................................................................... 5
4.4 Student Support Services ............................................................................................................. 5
5 HOW TO STUDY ONLINE ............................................................................................................ 6
5.1 What does it mean to study fully online? ....................................................................................... 6
5.2 The two module sites .................................................................................................................... 6
5.3 myUnisa tools ............................................................................................................................... 6
6 ASSESSMENT ............................................................................................................................. 7
6.1 Assessment plan .......................................................................................................................... 7
6.2 Year mark and final examination/other options ............................................................................. 8
7 CONCLUSION.............................................................................................................................. 9

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1 INTRODUCTION

Dear Student

Welcome to the module Sustainability and Greed.

Warning: This is a crazy module!

Our basic commitment in this module is the following:

If by the end of this module you have not:

 wondered whether you are registered for the wrong degree;

 wondered whether your lecturers have lost their marbles;

 wondered whether you have lost your marbles;

 had to go for a walk to clear your mind;

 wondered what the point of all this stuff is; or

 wondered what the point of everything is;

well then you need to check that you have a pulse!

This module is meant to confuse you. It's meant to force you to scratch your head. It’s meant to
force you to question things and to wonder. In short, it's meant to force you to THINK.

Intrigued? Well read on......

1.1 Getting started …

Part of the craziness is that this is a fully online module.

Because of this, you must go online to see your study materials and to do all that you need to
do to pass the module.

Specifically you need to go to the website https://my.unisa.ac.za. If you have never logged on to
this before you will need to claim your Unisa login as we describe below under “Joining
myUnisa”. If you have already done this, you will need to login with your student number and
password.

myUnisa is Unisa’s online campus and so once you have logged in you will see a list of all the
modules for which you are registered. These will appear in the bar of sites listed across the top
of your myUnisa web page. You may need to press the “ ” button to see all of them.

One of these will have a code which looks something like this:

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 SUS1501-18-S1-<some number>T (e.g. SUS1501-19-S1-100T) or

SUS1501-18-S2-<some number>T (e.g. SUS1501-19-S2-100T)

This is your Sustainability and Greed group site. Once you have found your group site, you
need to go to the “Overview” page and read this carefully. This will tell you what the next steps
are.

WARNING: If you jump straight to the Assignments tool as many students seem to do, you will
be completely lost!

2 PURPOSE OF SUS1501
The purpose of this signature module is for commerce students - that’s you - to be reminded of
your humanity, and for you to begin a lifetime journey of critical thinking. This purpose is
pursued by: a) you exploring selected moral and political philosophy theories and basic informal
logic; and b) you applying these theories to “case studies” dealing with contemporary social
themes including sustainability and greed.

3 LECTURER AND CONTACT DETAILS

3.1 Lecturer

The primary lecturer for this module is Prof Neil Eccles:

Department: Department Applied Management

Telephone: 012 433 4685

Email: sus1501@unisa.ac.za

(Contacting us by email is much more reliable and has the added advantage of there being a
record of all correspondence.)

3.2 Teaching Assistants

In this module, you will be divided into groups of between 40 and 50 students and each group is
assigned a Teaching Assistant. It is the Teaching Assistant’s job to guide you in the module.
They will provide assistance and feedback on assignments, will facilitate discussions and will
ultimately mark your assignments.

You will only be able to contact the teaching assistants through the public discussion forums on
your group site.

3.3 Department

You can contact the Department Applied Management as follows:

Telephone number: 012 433 4696

Email: groensf@unisa.ac.za

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3.3 University

To contact the University, follow the instructions in the brochure Study @ Unisa. Remember to
have your student number available whenever you contact the University.

Whenever you contact a lecturer, please include your student number and your group number
to enable the lecturer to help you more effectively.

4 RESOURCES
4.1 Joining myUnisa

To go to the myUnisa website directly, go to https://my.unisa.ac.za. Click on the Claim UNISA

Login on the top of the screen on the myUnisa website. You will then be prompted to give your
student number in order to claim your initial myUnisa details, as well as your myLife email login
details.

For more information on myUnisa, consult the brochure Study @ Unisa, which you received
with your study material: www.unisa.ac.za/brochures/studies

4.2 myLife email account

It is very important that you activate your myLife email address and monitor this for emails. Over
the course of the semester important emails will be sent to you via this email address and it will
be assumed that you have read them.

4.3 Library services and resources

The Unisa Library offers a range of information services and resources. For detailed Library
information go to http://www.unisa.ac.za/sites/corporate/default/Library

The Library has created numerous Library guides available at http://libguides.unisa.ac.za

Recommended guides include:

 Request and download recommended material:

http://libguides.unisa.ac.za/request/request
 Finding and using library resources and tools:
http://libguides.unisa.ac.za/Research_skills
 Frequently asked questions about the Library:
http://libguides.unisa.ac.za/ask
 Services to students living with disabilities:
http://libguides.unisa.ac.za/disability

4.4 Student Support Services

The Study @ Unisa brochure is available on myUnisa: www.unisa.ac.za/brochures/studies

This brochure has all the tips and information you need to succeed at distance learning and,
specifically, at Unisa.

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5 HOW TO STUDY ONLINE
5.1 What does it mean to study fully online?

Ok – so this module is taught fully online. So what?

Well very simply this means that this is likely to be pretty different from your other modules at
Unisa in the following three ways:

 All of your study materials and learning activities are online, on myUnisa. In other
words, there are no printed study materials from Unisa – no tutorial letters (except for this
one) and no study guide. There is also no prescribed text book.

 All of your assignments must be submitted online. This means that you do all your
activities and submit all your assignments on myUnisa. In other words, you cannot post your
assignments through the South African Post Office or drop them in an assignments box on
a Unisa campus. Any assignments that are submitted as hard copies will simply be returned
to you unmarked.

 Most of the communication between yourself and the university will also happen
online – via your myLife email, and in the Discussion forums. Your lecturers and Teaching
Assistants will communicate with you in the same way – through emails, with
Announcements and in the Discussion forums.

5.2 The two module sites

Technically you will have two module sites for the module Sustainability and Greed:

 Your group site: This is the most important work space for this module. It is here that you
will find all of your study material. It is also here that you will interact with your fellow
students and your Teaching Assistant, and where you will submit all of your assignments.
Your group site code will look as follows: SUS1501-19-S1-<some number>T

 The module site: The site code for this site will look as follows: SUS1501-19-S1.
Essentially you should never need to go to this site. You may, however, from time to time
get general announcements sent to your myLife email address from your Primary Lecturer
from this site.

5.3 myUnisa tools

The first thing to do once you have accessed your group site will be to read the Welcome
message on the Overview page very carefully.

Besides welcoming you again, this will point you in the direction of your STUDY GUIDE. Here,
you will find the study material for the module. These are released as you progress through the
material.

Other than this, you are likely to also make use of the following additional tools, particularly
when it comes to submitting assignments:

 Self Assessments tool: This is where you will do your first assignment, the very important
Crossroads assignment. It is pretty self-explanatory. You go to the “Self Assessments” tool
and complete the multiple choice questions. Please don’t forget to actually submit the
assignment though.

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 Discussions tool: This tool is the place for online discussions, where you share your ideas
and insights with the other students in your group. Besides being a place where you can
generally engage with the rest of your group, you will submit seven assignments into
various discussion forums.

 Assignments tool: Your final “portfolio” assignment will involve you typing a written
assignment. This typed assignment must be submitted using the online “Assignments” tool
on myUnisa.

We hope that by giving you extra ways to study the material and practise all of the activities, you
will succeed in the online module. To get the most out of the online module you MUST go online
regularly to complete the activities and assignments on time.

6 ASSESSMENT
6.1 Assessment plan

There are a total of eight assignments in this module. And there is a final “portfolio” assignment
which replaces the typical venue based examination.

The assignment due dates are as follows:

Assignment Semester 1 Semester 2

Due date Due date

Assignment 01 – At a Crossroads 20 April 2 October

Assignment 02 – Rules is rules – Deontology 2 March 17 August

Assignment 03 – It’s all about consequences - 13 March 28 August

Consequentialism

Assignment 04 - A higher purpose - Virtue ethics 16 March 31 August

Assignment 05 – Fair’s Fair – Distributive justice 27 March 11 September

Assignment 06 – Greenies – Environmental ethics 30 March 14 September

Assignment 07 – Sustainable development? 17 April 30 September

Assignment 08 – A darn good argument – Informal logic 20 April 2 October

Final Portfolio 11 May 19 October

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Because this is an online module, the assignments are not provided in this tutorial letter.
Instead, the assignments are provided online as they become due. Instructions for doing them
are available in the online STUDY GUIDE.

6.2 Year mark and final examination/other options

The assignment mark allocations are as follows:

Assignment % of year mark

Assignment 01 – At a Crossroads 12

Assignment 02 – Rules is rules – Deontology 10

Assignment 03 – It’s all about consequences - Consequentialism 10

Assignment 04 – ME, ME, ME – Egoism 12

Assignment 05 – Fair’s Fair – Distributive justice 12

Assignment 06 – Greenies – Environmental Ethics 12

Assignment 07 – Sustainable Development? 16

Assignment 08 – Greed is good? 16

Final Portfolio – Assignment 09

The 8 assignments count a total of 80% of your overall final mark.

The remainder of the final mark is made up by a “portfolio” assignment – Assignment 09.

To assist you in estimating your progress, there is a Mark Calculator in the Additional
Resources tool on myUnisa.

CRITICAL ASSESSMENT CONSIDERATIONS:

 Assignment deadlines: Assignment deadlines are strictly adhered to. If your assignment is
late you will get zero (0) unless you have a very good excuse with supporting evidence.

 Plagiarism: Please note that copying in any form will not be tolerated. This includes
but is not limited to copying from your fellow students, from the internet, or from the study
guide. Please read the study guide section on plagiarism carefully to ensure that you do not
fall foul of this rule. If we detect any copying whatsoever you will be given zero (0) for your
assignment immediately.

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 You must do your final portfolio even if you have accumulated enough marks in your
assignments to pass. If you do not, you will be marked as “Absent from exam” and you will
fail the module.

 If you get less than 40% for your final portfolio, your year mark will not be included into your
final grade.

7 CONCLUSION
That’s all for this TUT101 I think. Please don’t hesitate to contact us by email if you are
experiencing problems with the content of this tutorial letter or with any academic aspect of the
module.

We wish you a fascinating and satisfying journey through the learning material and trust that
you will complete the module successfully.

Enjoy the journey!

Neil

(Prof Eccles)

Institute for Corporate Citizenship