The 7th edition of the Annual Ife Summer Institute, a two-week academic engagement for doctoral and postdoctoral researchers from around the world commences Monday, 24th July at Obafemi Awolowo University in Ile-Ife, Nigeria. ‘Advancing Africa Through the Academy: Innovation, Creativity, and Service’ is the theme. It is an annual programme organised by Jacob Kehinde Olupona, a Nigerian Professor at Harvard University who was recently inducted into the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Sciences.  

In the 2023 edition, there will be approximately seventy Professors from all over the world participating as speakers and facilitators. This year, past fellows of the Institute and Professors administered the selection process for the applications and planned the programme, with the internal program committee taking the lead.  
 
Over 230 male and female doctoral and postdoctoral scholars from STEM and Non-STEM fields from countries such as Cameroon, Canada, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malaysia, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sénégal, Tanzania, Uganda, the United Kingdom, the United States, Zambia, and Zimbabwe applied to the Summer Institute in 2023. Only 73 were invited as in-person participants, including individuals with disabilities and nursing mothers, while 156 were invited as virtual participants.  
 
Based on the preliminary findings of the Graduate Employability research conducted by past fellows of the Institute in collaboration with the Michael and Henrietta Olupona Foundation and the Mastercard Foundation, this year’s edition will focus on how the creativity and innovation of the academy can promote African progress. The idea is to inspire participants to promote African development through research and to use African knowledge systems to chart a path to developing a sustainable master plan for the continent’s present and future. Consequently, the 2023 edition will be workshop-based, with conversations centred on creativity, innovation, and service through academic engagement on a variety of skills development-related topics.  

The 2023 Summer Institute commenced with a virtual Pre-Summer Institute titled ‘life cycle of empirical research,’ which was open to all early scholars, including the Institute’s intended fellows for 2023. The Pre-Summer Institute was organised by the Institute Secretariat with fellows of the Institute who participated in research on Graduate Employment in Africa sponsored by the Mastercard Foundation.  
 
The Pre-Summer Institute serves as a platform for training fellows and honing early career skills in the global community. It is also a platform for identifying talents within the Institute who could take over the leadership of several Institute-developed programmes. It is the belief of the Institute that its over 400 fellows should be continuously engaged in the program work of the Institute.  
 
The pre-summer institute’s objectives are to explain their research processes, including the tools used for research analysis, to help fellows, particularly those involved in the five-country research conducted by the Institute for Advanced studies, understand research beyond the classroom, and to develop project planning and management skills.  

Kamari Maxine Clarke, a distinguished Canadian professor at the Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies at the University of Toronto, will deliver the keynote address on ‘Advancing Academia in Africa as an Otherwise Project: Foundations, Methods, and Transmission as a 21st Century Challenge,’ while Olupona will deliver the Convener’s address. Professor Simeon Bamire, Vice Chancellor of Obafemi Awolowo University, is the chief host.  

This year’s session will feature a variety of workshops, discussion panels, and host two special lectures: the Annual Babatunde Ogunnaike’s STEM Lecture to be delivered by Matthew Adigun, a Senior Professor of Computer Science from the University of Zululand, South Africa, and the IIAS-MCF Inaugural Entrepreneurship and Employability Lecture by Professor Joseph Eyo. Several professors from universities in the United Kingdom, the United States, and many African countries are also participating in this year’s programme.

[Thisday]