Rika is a Senior Lecturer in Actuarial Science with a MComm in Mathematical Statistics. She is an Associate Actuary with both the Actuarial Society of South Africa and the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (UK). She is very active in the educational field of both professional bodies.
Simon Louw, a Fellow of the Actuarial Society of South Africa (FASSA), is a Senior Lecturer in Actuarial Science, with a focus on post-graduate courses. With over 26 years of industry experience, Simon brings a practical perspective to his teaching. Simon is passionate about helping students navigate the complexities of actuarial science. His teaching style is engaging, focusing on bridging theory and practice to prepare students for real-world challenges.
Simon’s research interests include professionalism and ethics in actuarial practice, the public interest, and risk and capital management for life insurers. Beyond his academic and consulting responsibilities, Simon actively volunteers with the Actuarial Society of South Africa.
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Dr. Mesias Alfeus is a Senior Lecturer in the department of Statistics and Actuarial Science at Stellenbosch University, South Africa and he is also a NITheCS Quantitative Finance Research Programme Manager.
He has a PhD in Quantitative Finance from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) in Australia with a dissertation entitled “Stochastic Modelling of New Phenomena in Financial Markets”. He is a Mathematician by training with a BSc degree in Mathematics and Physics from the University of Namibia. He holds masters and honours degrees in Financial Mathematics both with Cum Laude from Stellenbosch University, South Africa.
He holds a long list of academic awards, and he was the winner of the 2018 International Young Investigator Training Program (YITP) prize at the XIX Workshop on Quantitative Finance held at the University of Rome Tre in Italy. He held an academic visiting position at the University of Padova, northern Italy.
He previously worked as a Risk Analyst at Namibian Financial Institutions Supervisory Authority (NAMFISA), a Research Associate at UTS Finance, a Lecturer of Financial Mathematics at the University of Wollongong Australia, and AIFMRM Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at the University of Cape Town. His papers have been published in the most prestigious journals such as Journal of Futures Markets, Financial Innovation, Journal of Commodity Markets, Journal of Economics Dynamics, and Control, International Journal of Theoretical and Applied Finance, etc. His current research interests focus on Computational and Mathematical Finance, more specifically in numerical methods for pricing of options and model calibration including model empirical analysis.
Daniel Polakow received his PhD in Mathematical Statistics from the University of Cape Town in 2000. He is currently an Associate Professor at Stellenbosch University where he directs the Financial Risk Management programme, and is an adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Cape Town in the School of Actuarial Science.
His research interests currently encompass financial engineering, investment management and derivatives.
Ruan Buys is a lecturer in Financial Risk Management, and has obtained various degrees at Stellenbosch University under the department of Statistics and Actuarial Science. His academic journey began with a BCom (Mathematics), followed by a BComHons in Financial Risk Management and subsequently a MCom in the same.
His current research interests include the visualisation of multi-dimensional data through biplots and is actively involved with the Centre for Multi-dimensional Data Visualisation (MuViSU) in the department. Working collaboratively with its members, he published a package in R titled ‘bipl5’ – an attempt to modernise the biplot display. Building on his former research, he aims to pursue a PhD with focal areas in data visualisation as well as fraud detection.
Zoë-Mae, a Statistics lecturer since 2021, embarked on her academic journey by completing her undergraduate degree, a BCom in Economic Sciences, in 2017, and subsequently earned her BCom Honours degree in Statistics at Stellenbosch University in 2018. In 2022, she graduated with an MCom in Statistics and is currently pursuing her passion for academia through a PhD in Statistics.
Her research specialisation revolves around multi-dimensional text visualisation. Zoë-Mae is also a member of the Centre for Multi-dimensional Data Visualisation (MuViSU). Notably, her collaborative work with her supervisor, Dr Nienkemper-Swanepoel, culminated in their research poster titled ‘Visualising opinions on the COVID-19 pandemic.’ This achievement secured them the first place in the IASC Data Analysis Competition of 2023.
Morné Lamont was born in George, South Africa in 1977. He attended Kretzenshope primary school and George secondary school where he matriculated in 1994. He completed his undergraduate studies in 1997 at the University of the Western Cape, majoring in Statistics and Economics.
He completed his postgraduate studies in Statistics at Stellenbosch University and obtained his PhD in 2008. He started his lecturing career at Stellenbosch University in 2003 and has taught Statistics at undergraduate and postgraduate level. He is an applied statistician with teaching and research interests in Multivariate Statistics, Statistical learning, Computing in R and Data science.
Before 2003 he worked as a marketing information analyst for a Direct Mailing company (1999) and as an assistant biometrician for the South African Agricultural Research Council (2000-2002).
Sugnet Lubbe’s field of research is focused in general on multivariate data analysis, and more specifically biplots and graphical visualisation of multi-dimensional data. Her research is both on theoretical developments of methods for visualisation of multi-dimensional data, R software developed to implement methods and applications leading to new extensions of current methodology.
After a 13-year stint in the corporate world, she moved to academia in July 2009, as associate professor at the University of Cape Town and in January 2017, she joined Stellenbosch University as a professor in statistics.
She is an elected member of the International Statistics Institute, has served as executive committee member of the International Federation of Classification Societies and the International Association of Statistical Computing. She is also the chair of the Multivariate Data Analysis Special Interest Group in the South African Statistical Association.
Paul J Mostert received his PhD in Mathematical Statistics from the University of South Africa in 2000. Currently associate professor in Mathematical Statistics and affiliated with Stellenbosch University and was chairperson of the Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science from 2017 to 2022. He is a member and fellow of the South African Statistical Association, as well as a member of ISBA. He is on the editorial board of the Journal, Patterns. His research interests are Bayesian Survival and Reliability analysis.
Chris received his PhD in Mathematical Statistics from Stellenbosch University in 2012. He also has two master’s degrees – one in Mathematical Statistics from Stellenbosch University, and a second in Biostatistics from Hasselt University in Belgium (then LUC).
He has been teaching for over 25 years and he has been responsible for the designing and presenting of various biostatistics post-graduate degree programs and modules at Stellenbosch.
His research currently involves working closely with SU staff from the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences to apply his biostatistical knowledge to solve practical problems for South African doctors and patients.
Priyanka Nagar started her academic studies at the University of Pretoria where she obtained her BSc in Actuarial and Financial Mathematics, BSc (Hons) and MSc in Mathematical Statistics with her PhD in Mathematical Statistics in 2023. Her research interests are in the field of directional statistics and distribution theory. Her PhD focused on multivariate models for directional data and included applications related to wind energy and biomechanical studies. Her current research interests continue in directional statistics with contemporary applications in environmental sciences.
Johané Nienkemper-Swanepoel is a Lecturer in Statistics, Mathematical Statistics and Data Science modules in the Department. She started her academic career at the University of the Free State (Bloemfontein) where she obtained her BSc, BSc(hons) and MSc in Mathematical Statistics with distinction.
She started teaching at Stellenbosch University in 2013 and obtained her PhD in Mathematical Statistics at Stellenbosch University in 2019, which focused on the amalgamation of missing data approaches and biplot visualisation.
She is a founding member of the Centre for Multi-Dimensional Data Visualisation (MuViSU) within the Department. She was a fellow of the Pathways to a Successful Academic Career Programme (PSACP) in 2021. She is currently serving on the executive committee of the Multivariate Data Analysis Group (MDAG) of the South African Statistical Association (SASA) and on the council of the International Federation of Classification Societies (IFCS).
Stephan van der Westhuizen graduated from his Master’s degree (cum laude) in Statistics from the University of Stellenbosch. He then graduated from Wageningen University & Research in the Netherlands with his PhD under the supervision of Professor Gerard Heuvelink. His doctoral research, titled “The Enhancement of the use of Machine Learning in Digital Soil Mapping,” was about developing methodologies to enhance the predictive capabilities of machine learning models commonly applied in the field of soil mapping. His areas of focus include the integration of measurement errors in soil samples into machine learning models, conducting multivariate mapping, accounting for censored soil data with machine learning, and analysing soil map predictions using explainable machine learning (XML/XAI). Stephan is a recipient of both the Climate, Food and Farming and Global Research Alliance Development Scholarships (CLIFF-GRADS) program, as well as the competitive Thuthuka research grant from the NRF.
