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Former Mak VC Prof Ssebuwufu appointed Chairperson UbuntuNet Alliance

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1st November 2013, Lilongwe, Malawi. UbuntuNet Alliance, the Regional Research and Education Network for Eastern and Southern Africa, today announces the appointment of Professor John Ssebuwufu as the new Chairperson of the Alliance with effect from 1st November 2013. Professor Ssebuwufu succeeds Professor Zimani Kadzamira who stepped down on 12th February 2013 after his second three year term ended as required by the Articles of Association of the Alliance.

Professor John Ssebuwufu was until the end of October 2013 Director of Research Programmes at the Association of African Universities (AAU) in Ghana. He also recently worked as Acting Secretary General of the organisation. He is a member of several international Committees and Boards, including the World Bank Millennium Science Initiative where he acts as one of the Technical Experts for Uganda. He is also the
Non-Executive Director and Chairman of the Board of Directors at CITIBANK (Uganda) Ltd; a subsidiary of Citigroup New York.

Prior to his appointment at AAU, Professor Ssebuwufu served in various positions, the most noteworthy being that of Vice Chancellor of Uganda’s premiere university, Makerere University, from 1993 to 2004. His tenure saw the total transformation of the university to a dynamic computerized institution responding to national and regional research and education needs with a multiplicity of global research and funding linkages.

“I regard it as a special honour and privilege bestowed on me to have been nominated and appointed as the next Chairperson of this very important network – the UbuntuNet Alliance. I thank the Board and the appointing authority for giving me the opportunity to once again serve Africa in this capacity. Given the enormous success of my predecessor, Professor Zamini Kadzamira, I can only hope that mine will equal his achievements as first chairperson of the Alliance. I thank him for his exemplary leadership and selfless service to this young network. I wish him more success in his future endeavors, said Professor Ssebuwufu.

Dr Iman Abuel Maaly Abdelrahman, the Deputy Chairperson of the Alliance, who was acting Chairperson said, "After six great years with our beloved former Chairman Professor Kadzamira, we are delighted to welcome Professor Ssebuwufu at the helm of the Alliance. We are confident that he will do an outstanding job for the Alliance with all his knowledge and experience. And we have no doubt that with his leadership; the Alliance will continue to achieve great successes."

“It reflects the good standing of UbuntuNet Alliance that, following the exemplary service of Prof Kadzamira as Founding Chairperson, we have now another eminent person with a similar global outlook and experience to steer the Alliance through our next phase of development. I personally know him as a principled action oriented person, an elder who took to ICT like a six year old,” said Tusu, CEO of the Alliance.

Professor Ssebuwufu’s term of office will run for three years with the possibility of one renewal. During this period, the Alliance is confident of following a steady course towards the transformation of the African
academic and research family and integrating it fully within the global REN community.

About UbuntuNet Alliance:
UbuntuNet Alliance is the regional Research and Education Network for Eastern and Southern Africa. It was established in 2005 as a not-for-profit regional association of National Research and Education Networking (NRENs) in Eastern and Southern Africa. Its current membership consists of 14 NRENs. The Alliance works towards enabling collaboration in research and education over world class networks, and has the primary responsibility for the regional research and education data network, UbuntuNet.

For more information, please visit: www.ubuntunet.net/

Mark Wamai

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Special Exam Results -Diploma in Performing Arts 2025/26

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The results for the 2025/2026 special entry examination for the Diploma in Performing Arts held on Saturday 17th May, 2025. Candidates who scored a final mark of 50% and above passed the Examination and have been recommended to the university’s Admissions Committee for consideration.

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Mature Age Scheme Exam Results for 2025/2026

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The Office of Academic Registrar, Makerere University has released full results for the Mature Age Entry Scheme Examinations for the Academic Year 2025/2026 held on Saturday 14th December, 2024.

The Candidates who scored a final mark of 50% and above passed the examination and have been recommended by the Pre-Entry & Mature Age Committee to the University’s Admissions Board for Consideration.

The Aptitude Exam  Results for 2025/2026 Academic Year released in February 2025 can be found here.

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Call for Application: 2025 SNRM session 4 Summer School

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Participants in focused group discussions. Leiden-Delft-Erasmus East Africa Research Network (LEARN) in collaboration with the Urban Action Lab at Makerere University a workshop to deliberate strategies for mitigating the impacts of climate change in urban centres in the East African Region, Theme: “Resilient Urban Futures: Adapting Livelihoods to Climate Change”, 4th-5th September 2024, School of Public Health Auditorium, Kampala Uganda.

Context:
Natural resources in Africa are being depleted at an alarming rate due to several factors, including unsustainable human activities, climate change, and population growth. A primary condition of sustainable development is to ensure that the pressures do not exceed the environmental limits, and that demand for the resources does not exceed levels that can be sustainably provided by nature. Therefore, there is a pressing need for transformative, systems-thinking approaches and tools that can tackle the diverse challenges facing these systems. In Africa, this need is compounded by a lack of data and monitoring, which significantly hinders sustainable decision-making.

Investing in young scientists who are committed to take lead in sustainable management of Africa’s natural resources is very important. Capacity building of young scientists will enhance their knowledge and skill on sustainable natural resources and their involvement for implementation of the sustainable development goals (SDG’s) in Africa. To this effect, SNRM summer schools have been implemented in three sessions in 2019, 2020, and 2022 with support from Volkswagen Foundation; to build a critical mass of skilled and competent young natural resource scientists in Africa through training, capacity building and mentorship. Session 4 (2025) will target competent young scientists (MSc and PhD students) in Africa and Germany to further develop their knowledge and skills in systems thinking, advanced data collection and analysis, and application of emerging digital technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), internet of things (IoT), and embracing transdisciplinary approaches. In addition, we include an ideation workshop where students can work on real problems to come up with solutions for sustainable transformations in natural resource use.

Organizers: Leibniz Universität – Hannover (Germany), University of Antananarivo, University of Abomey Calavi (Benin), Makerere University (Uganda), University of Ghana (Ghana), University of Parakou (Benin), The Technical University of Kenya, with financial support from the Volkswagen Foundation (Germany).

Venue and dates: Nairobi, Kenya, 16-28 November 2025

Target: MSc and PhD students, early in the program of less than 35 years of age from any university/research institution in either sub-Saharan Africa or Germany with an interest in natural resources management.

Participants and Scholarships: The course is fully funded and open to 20 MSc and PhD students from Africa, and 5 from Germany. Funding will cover the costs of air ticket, accommodation, meals, visa, and transportation. However, participants will cover the cost of their travel health insurance.

Topics

SNRM Summer School Session 4: Transformative pathways in biodiversity management and conservation.
This summer school is designed to deliver four modules over a two-week period. The modules are designed to enable the students to acquire new ways of designing data collection protocols and analysis for transformative sustainable natural resources management.

Module 4.1: Data collection I
Skills in data collection for a transformative and sustainable management of natural resources (water, wildlife, forest, land, livestock, crops) monitoring and data collection techniques; remote monitoring tools, earth observation system data, e.g. satellite data sources, LIDAR, and UAV aerial images. Collect and analyse In-situ data on biotic and abiotic parameters, map and analyse data using R or Google Earth Engine, field data collection and retrieving data from online databases.

Module 4.2 Data management and processing
Introduction to tools and methods of managing large and diverse data sets of natural resources such as time series, spatial, directional, and multivariate data. Practicals will include data storage, organization and conversion into various formats using databases such as PostgreSQL and statistical programming software such as R and Python; scripts.

Module 4.3 Ecological monitoring, modelling and management
This module aims to teach participants how to anticipate and validate trends that can be observed in various ecosystems. Lectures include ecological monitoring and its design; population monitoring studies; metrics in population monitoring; methods for monitoring and assessing marine ecosystems; human ecology to socio-ecological systems; climate change impact of ecosystems; suitability assessments; overview of the principles underlying wildlife monitoring and prediction systems for climate change adaptation. Practicals will include field data collection (individual and group); ecological data analysis using R or PAST; modelling and experiencing the behaviour of complex systems using Vensim.

Module 4.4 Natural habitat restoration ideation lab
This module is designed to spur students’ innovation and creativity, and to help students comprehensively identify interdependencies across the 17 SDG goals. Participants will be trained on ideation processes for solutions and intervention for transformative natural resource management. They will work collaboratively in small groups on case studies and develop pathways of transformative sustainable natural resource management. Examples of projects include forest (mangrove) ecosystem and habitat restoration, improved technologies for agricultural production, nature-based solutions for improving water quality, and reversing land degradation.

Language: The course will be delivered in English. Participants are expected to be fluent in writing and speaking the English language.

How to apply

Applicants are kindly requested to fill in the application form available from https://snrmafrica.com/ and submit the following documents in English through the system.

  • a curriculum vitae (maximum 2 pages)
  • a letter of motivation (maximum 1 page)
  • a confirmation of university enrolment
  • a reference letter from the academic supervisor
  • project summary of MSc/ PhD project (1 page including objectives, methodology
    and key findings or expected outcomes).

Important dates
Application deadline: 30th June 2025.
Announcement of accepted applicants: 15th August 2025.
Confirmation of attendance by selected participants: 12th Sept 2025.
Summer school held: 16 – 28 Nov 2025.

Further information is available from

The secretariat info@snrmafrica.com
Dr Lydia Olaka lydiaolaka@tukenya.ac.ke
Prof. Dr. Hartmut Stuetzel stuetzel@gem.uni-hannover.de

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