Daniel Okunbor, Fayetteville State University, Selected to Work with Covenant University

Daniel Okunbor from Fayetteville State University was awarded a fellowship by the Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Program to travel to Nigeria to work with Covenant University on Curriculum Development in Machine Learning and Cyber Security to Strengthen Postgraduate Programme in Computer Science. The project is designed to improve the academic quality of ICT degree programs at Covenant University with the hope of increasing the number of ICT degree recipients who are trained in machine learning and cybersecurity and advancing research training among faculty and students through supervision of postgraduate theses and dissertations. Daniel Okunbor will work in collaboration with Nicholas Ikhu-Omoregbe who will serve as the host faculty.

Daniel Okunbor's project is part of a broader initiative that will pair 51 African Diaspora scholars with one of 43 higher education institutions and collaborators in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda to work together on curriculum co-development, research, graduate teaching, training and mentoring activities in the coming months.  The visiting Fellows will work with their hosts on a wide range of projects that include controlling malaria, strengthening peace and conflict studies, developing a new master's degree in variety of disciplines, training and mentoring graduate students in information technology, archiving African indigenous knowledge, creating low cost water treatment technologies, building capacity in microbiology and pathogen genomics, and developing a forensic accounting curriculum. To deepen the ties among the faculty members and between their home and host institutions, the program is providing support to several program alumni to enable them to build on successful collaborative projects they conducted in previous years.

The Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Program, now in its sixth year, is designed to increase Africa's brain circulation, build capacity at the host institutions, and develop long-term, mutually-beneficial collaborations between universities in Africa and the United States and Canada. It is funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and managed by the Institute of International Education (IIE) in collaboration with United States International University-Africa (USIU-Africa) in Nairobi, Kenya, which coordinates the activities of the Advisory Council. A total of 385 African Diaspora Fellowships have now been awarded for scholars to travel to Africa since the program's inception in 2013.

Fellowships match host universities with African-born scholars (individually or in small groups) and cover the expenses for project visits of between 21 and 90 days, including transportation, a daily stipend, and the cost of obtaining visas and health insurance.

See full list of 2018 projects, hosts and scholars and their universities.

Please direct all questions related to the application process to AfricanDiaspora@iie.org.

About Fayetteville State University

Fayetteville State University is a constituent institution of The University of North Carolina and the second-oldest public institution of higher education in the state, having been founded in 1867. FSU offers degrees at the baccalaureate, master's, and doctoral levels. With more than 6,300 students, Fayetteville State University is among the most diverse institutions in the nation. To learn more about Fayetteville State University, visit https://www.uncfsu.edu. Chancellor James A. Anderson is the 11th chief executive officer.