On April 20, 2022, the Phd Fellows at Makerere University also known as Pf@Mak held a meeting at Senate Building where the outgoing executive members handed over to a new executive.

The purpose of this Fellowship is to cultivate and promote an enriching environment for conducting Doctoral Research that is of both academic and applied nature for Makerere University and the entire globe. Enshrined in the Pf@Mak Constitution, the forum’s mission is:

To bring together PhD fellows to actively provide each other with mutual academic support, producing timely high quality research through networking, peer reviewing, sharing funding opportunities and timely study completion.

The Pf@Mak has 500 registered students from the 10 Mak Colleges and Makerere University Business School (MUBS). The Fellowship Executive is comprised of a President, Vice President, General Secretary, Speaker, Finance Secretary, 11 College Representatives including MUBS, 3 Members of Academic Affairs Committee and 3 Members of Welfare Affairs Committee. The Pf@Mak objectives are to:

• Establish fora for the members to provide academic peer support at University,
• College/School and Departmental levels,
• To cultivate long term relationships that are vital for continued multidisciplinary research and academic work,
• Represent the opinions of the student body to the appropriate authorities,
• Assist one another to identify potential funders/research grants,
• Serve as an avenue/platform through which PhD fellows can network (academically and socially), share ideas, engage in collaborative research/ and access relevant information.

The Fellowship’s Patron and Prof. Mukadasi Buyinza said that the University acknowledges and appreciates this Forum as a springboard for Peer Learning where students take stock of shared challenges and benchmark amongst themselves best practices. He promised to continue engaging University Top Management to support PhD students with a Common Room for PhD Colloquium and provide orientation to new students. He thanked the outgoing executive for the many achievements despite the COVID-19 pandemic. He wished the incoming executive the best of success in their tenure.

The outgoing Pf@Mak Speaker Mr Nathan Tumuhamye thanked his colleagues for providing extra effort in advancing the Fellowship’s objectives and urged the incoming executive to leverage on the goodwill of University Management to ensure PhD Students learning landscape is enhanced.

The incoming Pf@Mak President Mr. Gerald Zihembire Ahabwe, a PhD Fellow in the Department of Sociology, School of Social Sciences, on behalf of the Executive Committee promised to build on previous successes to work tirelessly towards a vibrant PhD Community at Makerere University in line with the University’s strategic direction of being a research-led institution. He promised to constructively engage Management and other stakeholders within Academia, Government and Industry for a turn-around in the way PhD students are organized and supported in their doctoral journeys for the socio-economic transformation of their communities.

The meeting ended with the outgoing executive members receiving certificates of appreciation from Prof. Mukadasi Buyinza for their efforts in steering the Fellowship .