The Inter-University Council for East Africa (IUCEA) has announced the award of the 60 Masters Fellowships under the ACE Scholarship Program. The ACE Scholarship is a World Bank-funded competitive scholarship program under the Eastern and Southern Africa Higher Education Centers of Excellence Project. The scholarship is awarded to top future talents and aims to enhance the participation of young African female scientists at postgraduate level, encourage regional student mobility, and identify and cultivate future leaders in the region.
Under the ACE Scholarship Program, female regional students are financed for two years to attain a Master’s degree at any of the 29 Africa Centers of Excellence (ACEs). This cohort will study full-time at an ACE of their choice in the priority discipline of Agriculture and related fields.
“I wish to congratulate the 60 female scholars from nine African countries who have been competitively selected for the Masters Fellowship Program of the World Bank ACE II Project,” said Prof. Goolam Mohamedbhai, the Chairperson of the Project’s Regional Steering Committee.
“An important criterion used in the selection process was that a candidate must study in an ACE outside her own country, in order to promote regional collaboration. Also, language is no longer a problem in higher education studies in Africa. For example, three of the scholars from French-speaking Burundi will be studying in English-speaking Malawi and Tanzania. I wish all the scholars success in their studies and I am confident that once they have graduated, they will play a key role in the development of Africa,” he said.
Dr. Roberta Malee Bassett, the Project’s Task Team Leader at the World Bank noted: “The World Bank is honoured to continue this African Centers of Excellence partnership with Malawi and Mozambique, to expand further the capacity to conduct and benefit from targeted, relevant, and high quality research in agriculture,” she said.
“These scholarships supporting cross-border scholarly engagement not only support these excellent scientists in their own learning but also build bridges that will ensure the countries of the region continue to learn from and collaborate to meet challenges shared across East and Southern Africa including food security and climate change,” said Bassett. “We wish these scholars much success in their post-graduate work at these fantastic ACE II centers.”
This is the third cohort under the ACE scholarship program. The first cohort was announced in 2018/2019 academic year. The scholarship covers tuition, stipend, research, visa fees, laptop, books/stationeries and a round trip air ticket between the beneficiary’s home country and the study destination. Names, areas of specialization and host institutions can be viewed on this list of candidates recommended for the award.
The objective of the ACE II Project is to strengthen selected Eastern and Southern African higher education institutions to deliver quality post- graduate education and build collaborative research capacity in the regional priority areas.
The Inter University Council for East Africa (IUCEA) is the regional facilitation unit (RFU) of the ACE II Project. As the RFU, IUCEA competitively selects and coordinates the ACEs, sets implementation guidelines, reviews results and progress, manages the scholarship program, facilitates private sector-university partnerships, and coordinates knowledge-sharing and networking among the ACEs.
