General
H.E. Amb. Pataki Visits Mak, Brokers Linkage to Romanian Universities
The Ambassador of Romania to Uganda, Her Excellency Julia Pataki on Friday, 26th April 2019 paid a courtesy call on the Vice Chancellor, Makerere University with the irresistible offer to broker collaborations between Ugandan and Romanian Universities. She was received by the Deputy Vice Chancellor in charge of Academic Affairs (DVCAA), Dr. Umar Kakumba and The Deputy Vice Chancellor in charge of Finance and Administration (DVCFA), Prof. William Bazeyo on behalf of the Vice Chancellor Prof. Barnabas Nawangwe.
H.E. Amb. Pataki, who was accompanied by H.E. Murungi Godwin, the Romanian Honorary Consul shared that Uganda is Romania’s priority when it comes to collaboration in the East African Region and looked forward to linking Ugandan Vice Chancellors to Romania’s National Council of Rectors.
“The exchange of Research, Professors, Students and courses is very important to us in this collaboration. I also must state it right from the start that Romania is looking forward to learning from Uganda and our collaborations are going to be mutually beneficial” reassured the Ambassador.
H.E. Pataki noted that previous research had indicated that Research, Agriculture and ICT were priority areas of collaboration on the African continent “and this collaboration will enable the Ugandan Vice Chancellors to plan strategically so as to align their collaborations with the Uganda Vision 2040.”
She thereafter extended an invitation through Makerere University for delegations from Ugandan Vice Chancellors to visit Romania in the second half of June 2019. The visit, she noted, would enable them to visit Romania’s leading Universities in the Capital Bucharest – with strong agriculture and veterinary medicine disciplines, in mid-Transylvania – with strong Medicine disciplines as well as many others in the North East bordering Moldova and other parts of Romania.
In his remarks, Dr. Umar Kakumba warmly welcomed Amb. Patika and thanked her for choosing to make Makerere University her first stop in this broad based collaboration initiative. He noted that Makerere offers various disciplines across a wide spectrum which has led to collaborations with the top universities on every continent.
“We are part of the African Research Universities Alliance (ARUA) which brings together sixteen of the region’s leading universities to generate knowledge and make our researchers and institutions globally competitive. We will therefore be delighted to shared areas of joint research, academic exchange for our mutual benefit” said Dr. Kakumba.
The DVCAA further offered to extend the Ambassador’s offer to other Universities at the next monthly meeting of the Uganda Vice Chancellor’s Forum.
Prof. William Bazeyo on his part thanked Amb. Patika for the offer that presents a lot of opportunities for Ugandan Universities to collaborate with counterparts in Romania. He spoke well of the Romanian field of Medicine, whose graduates have gone to share their specialised skills with colleagues at Mulago Hospital. He nevertheless requested Amb. Patika to make special provision for the girl child to access quality university education especially as the collaboration is still in its formative stages.
The Ambassador on her part concurred that the girl child still faces a number of challenges in accessing higher education even in more developed countries such as Romania. This, she added, calls for collective mindset change “We have to provide the necessary conditions for girls to access quality education even at lower levels and excel such that they can qualify for scholarships at higher levels.”
Article by Public Relations Office
By Moses Lutaaya
The Directorate of Graduate Training (DGT) has in collaboration with Centre for Teaching and Learning completed the training of the first cohort of Graduate Supervisors.
Participants were academic staff from two colleges namely, College of Engineering, Art and Design (CEDAT) and the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences (CAES).
The three-day training that took place at the Telepresence Centre, Senate Building ended on Friday 20thJune 2025.
In his closing remarks to the participants, the Director of Graduate Training Prof. Julius Kikooma said, “This is the first cohort we are working together with the Center for Teaching and Learning to put together continuous professional development Program so that we are able to enforce the new teaching and learning policy.”
He said that before lecturers are allocated students for supervision, they must first go through this form of formal teaching and learning training to equip them thoroughly with certification required of supervision of graduate students.
“We are coming up with process to ensure that the certificates earned by participants allow you to supervise graduate students. This is the direction of the university and we must ensure that such trainings are concluded and completed successfully by all participants”, Prof. Kikooma.
“We can only have you certified upon completing all the exercises in the training process. This is when you will be eligible to receive the work load for supervision”, He added.
“This training of Supervisors is going to be continuous so that all academic staff in colleges and schools are equipped. This first cohort is going to be our building block to the future trainings in the colleges.”
With such capacity building trainings, Prof. Kikooma said that the university is on the right path to achieving its targets in the new strategic plan of increasing the number of graduate students while progressively reducing the under graduate students.
He further hinted that, “We are in the process of writing a curriculum on this, which will be presented for approval before it is rolled out.”
He echoed all participants to share the knowledge they have acquired adding, “Share all you have learnt, do not keep it. Be open minded, have proper communication channels and the sky will be the limit for you.”
Dr. Robinah N. Kulabako, The Head of Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at CEDAT welcomed the training adding, “This training is very pertinent. I have had the opportunity to supervise Masters and PhD students for over 15 years and I must say that the need to be subjected to this training cannot be over emphasized because there is need to learn, unlearn and relearn many aspects involved in the supervision process.”
She added, “We are moving towards knowledge-based supervision rather than experience-based supervision. This means we must be informed and equipped to be able to advise, guide and mentor to be able to lead a successful supervision journey for both supervisor and supervisee.”
Dr. Andrew Gilbert Were – a lecturer at CEDAT and a participant said, “It is important that all supervisors of graduate students receive this certification from Makerere University through a systematic training process that enables them to attain diverse skills to facilitate learning of graduate students from diverse cultures and with unique set of circumstances.”
“This training is long overdue. In fact, it was an oversight that we could be allowed to supervise students without undergoing supervisors’ training.”
Dr. Dorothy Ssebowa, The Director Centre for Teaching and Learning support- CEES said, “The training this time round has had a mix of early career professionals including Lecturers, Supervisors and Professors share experiences. We have learnt a lot more from experienced supervisors who have shared practices on how they have done supervision over the years.”
“The knowledge and experience-based approaches have made this collaboration very active, interactive and learner centered which has resulted into a collaborative learning from the interdisciplinarity of staff from CEDAT and CAES. The issue now is to continue with professional development across all levels.” She added.
The Makerere University Directorate of Graduate Training (DGT) in collaboration with the Centre for Teaching and Learning completed the training of the first cohort of Graduate Supervisors. This activity was supported by the iCARTA – Institutionalization of Advanced Research Training in Africa, a NORHED II Project at Makerere University.
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