Nations across the globe including those on the African continent had to rapidly come to terms with coping and finding solutions to the challenges that beset them with the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic. African universities and indeed even those in the global north, had many challenges to overcome primarily with continuing education, responding to community needs, and providing accurate and continuous information to students and staff. Most universities responded with various levels of successes and they continue to confront the ongoing challenges from continued teaching and learning to financial sustainability.
AAP Perspectives is a new thought piece series that is published by the Michigan State University Press. Perspectives is issuing a call for contributions about "African Universities and the COVID-19 Pandemic", which is a follow on from the AAP dialogue series held between April – July 2020. The six-part dialogue series was organized to strengthen ties between the AAP consortium members and other stakeholders at the time of the crisis, catalyze action and share innovative solutions around key challenges, increase awareness of African universities as knowledge brokers/leaders on the continent, establish areas for future collaboration amongst the consortium, and ensure that investment in universities post COVID-19 is on the agenda of African governments, the private sector, and donors.
Perspectives welcomes contributions from anywhere in the world that are short, critical reflections of the responses of African universities and their key stakeholders to the pandemic. The six thematic sections of the thought piece is shown in Appendix 1 and the style guide is available in Appendix 2. The first section will share the immediate responses and lessons learnt by African universities including societal contributions; the other sections will address issues around international collaboration, educational access, food and economic security, psychosocial impact, as well as engagement with partners, donors, and stakeholders.
For the full call for contributions and submission details, visit:
https://aap.isp.msu.edu/engage/aap-perspectives/
Submission form and abstracts due by Nov. 30, 2020