Lebogang Boemo

Lebogang Boemo is a project manager at the South African Centre for Digital Language Resources (SADiLaR), a national research infrastructure hosted at North-West University and supported by the Department Of Science, Technology and Innovation. SADiLaR's mission is to advance digital language resources and technologies for South Africa's multilingual society, particularly focusing on under-resourced official languages.

Background and role

Lebogang Boemo serves as a Project Manager at SADiLaR, where she is responsible for coordinating and implementing strategic initiatives that support the centre's mandate in digital language research and resource development. In this capacity, she has played a key role in national projects aimed at promoting multilingualism and digital language inclusion across South Africa.

Prior to joining SADiLaR, Lebogang Boemo worked with the National Skills Fund, where she was involved in managing programmes that supported learnerships, internships, and staff skills development aligned to educational priorities. Her background in project management and administration has equipped her with the skills necessary to lead large-scale, multidisciplinary efforts.

Language resources

At SADiLaR, Lebogang Boemo has been involved in the Language Resources Audit, a nationwide initiative to assess and map language assets across South African higher education institutions. The Language Resource audit supports the implementation of the Department of Higher Education and Training’s Language Policy Framework, which seeks to promote the equitable development and use of all eleven official languages in teaching, learning, and administration.

Boemo engages with university management, academic staff, and student bodies to document existing linguistic resources, identify gaps, and support institutions in meeting policy requirements.

Boemo manages other key SADiLaR initiatives, including collaborative projects that expand language visibility and accessibility. For example, she co-leads the SADiLaR-Wikipedia-PanSALB (SWiP) project, which aims to increase the representation of South African Official languages on Wikipedia and promote broader participation from language communities in developing free, open digital content.

Boemo's leadership extends to representing SADiLaR at national forums that focus on education, multilingualism, and gender equity. At the Women Leaders in Higher Education Summit, she advocated for greater inclusion of women professionals in strategic research and policy roles, reinforcing the importance of diverse leadership in shaping South African research landscapes.