It was formed in January 2005 from the merger of the Cape Technikon and Peninsula Technikon, following years of change in the higher education landscape of South Africa. In 1993, the Technikons Act was promulgated, which allowed technikons to offer Bachelor's degrees, Master's and Doctoral degrees in Technology. In March 2001, Kader Asmal announced the National Plan on Higher Education, and in May 2002 he announced the possible merger of the two institutions, with the national working committee also recommending the University of the Western Cape to be included in the merger. Towards the end of 2002, the final merger was announced, and in October 2003 the new name was approved. The Executive Interim Management was appointed towards the end of 2004. Prof. L Vuyisa Mazwi-Tanga was appointed as the first Vice-Chancellor of CPUT in February 2006. Also at this time, the nine faculties of the original institutions were merged and re-organised into six: Applied Science, Business, Education and Social Sciences, Engineering, Health and Wellness Sciences, and Informatics & Design. A separate postgraduate unit was established to offer multidisciplinary postgraduate programmes and funded research known as the e-Innovation Academy, and as from March 2008 the Faculty of Informatics & Design Research Unit. The Department of Information Technology in collaboration with the Bridgetown Community, Athlone, COFISA and IDM launched the Athlone Living lab, a community ICT innovation project, in September 2008. This would be the first Living Lab in the Western Cape. Trevor Manuel was appointed chancellor of the university in April 2008. Foreign students, are required to pay double the fees of local students. There are currently just over 2000 international students enrolled. The university offers bursaries to master's and doctoral degree students.
Campuses
CPUT has five campuses:
The Bellville Campus, formerly the campus of the Peninsula Technikon
The Cape Town Campus, formerly the campus of the Cape Technikon in Zonnebloem
The Granger Bay Campus, housing the Cape Town Hotel School and the Survival Centre
The Wellington Campus, formerly the Boland College of Education
The Cape Town Campus is built on a portion of District Six.
Co-operative education
The large majority of courses offered by CPUT incorporate in-service training; the training consists of an internship, usually six months to a year. The University's comprehensive co-operative education policy ensures the student is placed within a company approved by the university; this ensures that institutional academic learning is incorporated into work-based content.
