Dr. Amulen Deborah Ruth from the College of Veterinary Medicine, Animal Resources and Biosecurity (CoVAB) is the winner of this year’s African Futures Research Leadership Program. Makerere University is a founder member of the Alliance for African Partnership (AAP) based at Michigan State University. Effective this year (2019), AAP has established its competitive visiting scholar program that targets early career female researchers from the eight AAP member institutions to be jointly supervised by faculty members from MSU and their home institution in research for impact, writing of scholarly and/or policy publications, dissemination of research results and grant proposals.

Deborah will participate in a structured academic advancement program while building bridges and lasting connections with MSU and across their cohort. She will also participate in the Future Africa Research Leadership Program at the University of Pretoria, which will provide her with training in the areas of thought leadership, team development, research development, engagement and collaboration, while building south-south collaboration with other African researchers.

The Makerere University mentor will visit MSU for one week of collaboration discussions. Towards the end of the program, MSU faculty mentors will spend one week at the early career researcher’s home institution to continue research collaboration with the researcher and their African co-mentor. Deborah’s mentors are Prof. Michael Ocaido and Assoc. Prof. Eric Benbow from Makerere and MSU respectively.

We wish Deborah a rewarding stay at Michigan State University.

Article by Professor Buyinza Mukadasi, Director, DRGT , Makerere University