Dr Nonjabulo Ndaba is a recipient of the South African Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) New Generation of Academics Programme (NGAP) scholarship and has been a lecturer in the Discipline of Occupational Therapy within the College of Health Sciences at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) since 2019. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Occupational Therapy from the University of Cape Town (2013), a Master of Public Health with a research focus on child development from UKZN (2019), and a PhD in Occupational Therapy with a focus on occupational therapy education from UKZN (2025).
Her clinical experience includes paediatric, physical, and community-based occupational therapy practice within the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Health. Dr Ndaba’s paediatric practice has focused on child development and functional participation in key occupations, with particular emphasis on school-based functioning, learning-related occupations, and participation across home, school, and community contexts.
In her academic role at UKZN, Dr Ndaba is actively involved in teaching, learning, and assessment within paediatric, foundational theory, and physical rehabilitation modules, and she coordinates research modules in the undergraduate curriculum. Her teaching and research are underpinned by a strong interest in child development and occupational performance, which she integrates across her academic and professional career.
As an emerging academic, Dr Ndaba is committed to lifelong learning, collaborative scholarship, and the advancement of occupational therapy. Her scholarly interests include paediatrics, health professions education, and community-based research. She has served as an external examiner and moderator for final-year occupational therapy programmes at several national higher education institutions, examined Master’s theses, successfully supervised Master’s students and undergraduate honours research groups, and authored and co-authored publications in national and international journals. She has also presented her work at national and international conferences and contributes to the academic community as a peer reviewer for a national scholarly journal.
Since February 2021, Dr Ndaba has served as the KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Chairperson of the Occupational Therapy Association of South Africa (OTASA). In this role, she has led community development initiatives and coordinated occupation-based disaster response efforts following floods, civil unrest, and other crises across the province. She currently serves on the branch executive committee in a mentoring and leadership capacity.
