This summer, 59 African-born scholars based in the United States and Canada will travel to Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda for 14-90 days to conduct academic projects with their peers at host universities in those countries. The Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Program (CADFP) Advisory Council announced today that it has selected forty-one African universities to host the Fellows, based on collaborative project proposals submitted by faculty members and administrators at the African universities, to meet specific needs at their universities. The visiting fellows will work with their hosts on a range of projects across disciplines, from agroforestry to e-learning modules for nursing, and from ethnomusicology to military mental health.
The Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Program, now in its third year, is designed to avert Africa’s brain drain, build capacity at the host institutions, and develop long-term, mutually-beneficial collaborations between universities in Africa and the United States and Canada. It is funded by Carnegie Corporation of New York and managed by the Institute of International Education (IIE) in collaboration with United States International University-Africa (USIU-Africa) in Nairobi, Kenya, which houses the Advisory Council.
This new round of Fellowships will support several projects that involve more than one host institution, to encourage cooperation among African universities. Several program alumni will also receive support, to enable them to build on previous successful collaborations to advance the projects and deepen the ties among the faculty members and their home and host institutions. Selected projects include:
- KCA University and African Nazarene University will join together to host a fellow who will hold seminars on research methodology and develop modules to train early career faculty on how to mentor graduate students and write and manage grants.
- A group of animal scientists will travel to the University of Nairobi to focus on building capacity in animal genetics and genomics: developing certificate and Masters’ programs and expanding joint research; teaching a regional post-graduate course for scientists from East and Central Africa; developing and providing software for laboratory use; improving the use of mobile health technology; and developing budgets and infrastructure.
- A theater professor from St. Louis will spend three months in University of the Western Cape in South Africa as a returning Fellow to complete the staging of an original musical he is producing based on the life of Mariam Makeba, a South African singer and civil rights activist nicknamed Mama Africa. “Zenzi, The Musical” is scheduled to premiere at his host university in Cape Town in May and move to his home university in the United States in September.
Fellowships match host universities with African-born scholars, and cover the expenses for the visiting scholars including transportation, a daily stipend, and the cost of obtaining visas and health insurance. A total of 169 Fellows have now been selected since the program’s inception in 2013.
Source: IIE