Archive for africa

Capstone Workshop: Improving STEM education in Ghana

A signature of the SIPA curriculum is the Capstone Workshop, a live consulting project on a real-world issue for an outside organization. You’ll work with small consulting teams of other SIPA students under the guidance of an expert faculty advisor.

This is just two of the Spring 2018 workshops out of the 80+ projects each year, and your project could be in the public, private, and nonprofit sector

Building a Hands-on Science Culture Among Ghanaian STEM Teachers

Client: Practical Education Network (PEN)

Based on the finding that one-off teacher trainings alone are not sufficient to enable teachers to implement hands-on science, the Capstone team developed an incentive strategy to increase teacher uptake of in-class activities. The team also made recommendations to improve PEN’s monitoring & evaluation practices, including providing guidance on data collection, analysis, and storage. The team’s final deliverables include toolkits, step-by-step implementation, and measurement guides for immediate incorporation into organization processes. Learn more here.

Clean Cooking Energy Enterprise in Uganda

Client: United Nations Capital Development Fund

In Uganda, only 2% of the population has access to clean cooking technologies while the majority of households rely on biomass to cook, thus making the expansion of the clean cooking sector a major challenge in the country. To fulfill the client’s requests of providing diagnostics to help the companies attract further technical and investment support, the Capstone team undertook background research on the sector, conducted interviews with international organizations and local associations, and took a weeklong field visit to Uganda to meet with local entrepreneurs and produced a set of deliverables, including company prescriptions, company profiles and a website with database feature, to advise them properly on the ways in which they could scale up their efforts. Learn more here.

Check out the full list of SIPA Capstone Workshops here.

Finding altruism in others in Tanzania

For students in the Master of Public Administration in Development Practice program, things may progress a little differently than for our other MPA and Master of International Affairs students. For example, while MPA and MIA students may elect to spend their summer between their first and second year however they wish, MPA-DP students are required to participate in a three-month summer field placement. And I use the term required loosely, as our students always enjoy their assignments. They work in one of 30 different countries to develop practical work experience in sustainable development practice and to gain first-hand understanding of how education, agriculture, health, nutrition, energy, water and community are interconnected. It’s both a challenging and rewarding experience that’s an essential part of the MPA-DP curriculum.

To see what it’s like for our MPA-DP students, today I’m sharing with you an experience Ana Carolina Diaz, MPA-DP ’16, had this summer while she’s working in Tanzania.

Read More →

concentrations, specializations, and co-curricular programs (oh my)

Let’s face it SIPA (School of International and Public Affairs) is a land of acronyms starting with the name itself. As if that didn’t make things confusing enough, every policy school has its own language when it comes to courses of study. Applicants frequently call the office wondering if they concentrate in Latin America or specialize in social policy (the answer is no to both, in my opinion) so I thought it might be useful to walk you through the difference between SIPA’s concentrations, specializations, and co-curricular programs.

SIPA offers six concentrations: Economic and Political Development (EPD), Energy and Environment (EE), Human Rights (HR), International Finance and Economic Policy (IFEP), International Security Policy (ISP), or Urban and Social Policy (USP). Energy and Environment, IFEP and USP offer two tracks each. For example my concentration is Urban and Social policy- Social track. Someone else might be International Finance and Economic Policy- Economic Policy.  Very loosely speaking, concentrations are the equivalent of undergraduate majors. All MPA and MIA students choose a concentration, except for students who are pursuing a dual degree.

Concentrations consist of five courses each. Some concentrations, for example Human Rights (HR) and USP, are extremely flexible allowing students to take one core course and then tailor the track to their interests through focus areas. Other concentrations, for example IFEP, are more structured and require students to fulfill five specific requirements from a distinct set of courses. When choosing a concentration, as either an applicant or a student, it is important to consider the skills you want to acquire during your time at SIPA and how you plan to market yourself afterward. If you need to gain a strong quantitative background, then IFEP might be the right choice for you. If you plan to market yourself as a Human Rights advocate, you might want to concentrate in HR. While students do not officially “double concentrate,” SIPA’s curriculum offers the flexibility to take courses outside of your concentration to gain additional skills or background in whatever area you choose.

In addition to concentrations, all non-dual degree seeking MIA and MPA students select a specialization. These would be the loose equivalent of an undergraduate minor. Specializations take one of two forms: regional (AfricaEast AsiaEast Central EuropeEuropeLatin AmericaMiddle EastRussia and the Former Soviet StatesSouth Asia or United States); or skill/policy based including, Advanced Policy and Economic Analysis (APEA),  Applied Science (AS),  International Conflict Resolution (ICR),  International Media, Advocacy and Communications (IMAC), International Organization (IO) and Management.  Students specialize in either a region or a skill/policy area, not both. The specialization requirements are three courses each so most students wind up fulfilling the requirements for at least one specialization just by following their own interests. Again, when considering a specialization students balance the skills and background they want to acquire while at SIPA with the ways in which they plan to market themselves post-graduation.  I will qualify for both a United States and Management specialization, but have chosen to specialize in management because I want to highlight expertise in organizational leadership as I apply to jobs. Any MIA or MPA student can concentrate or specialize in any combination, meaning that there are 180 possible combinations available to MIA and MPA’s alone!

Finally, we come to SIPA’s three co-curricular programs: Gender Policy (GP), Humanitarian Affairs (HA) and United Nations Studies Program (UNSP). Unlike concentrations and specializations participation in co-curricular programs is optional although from my personal experience, highly recommended! The three co-curricular programs are very different from one another in their requirements and you can find more about each program by clicking here. The co-curricular programs are extremely useful in establishing oneself as an expert if students plan to pursue post-SIPA careers in these specific fields. I will be able to list a certificate in gender policy alongside my MPA degree on my resume.  They tend to focus on gaining practical experience even more so than concentrations and are designed to give students a solid foundation and background in policy and practice in their professional field.   Anecdotally, I will share with you that the courses I have taken to satisfy the requirements for my Gender Policy co-curricular have been hands down my favorites at SIPA and have left me feeling confident and prepared to market myself as an expert in gender policy.

Incidentally, if you factor in our co-curricular programs, this brings the possible MIA and MPA combinations to 540! Whatever your policy interest there is a way to gain the skills you need here at SIPA.

 

 

Top 10 Things That only Happen at SIPA

The following post was contributed by second year SIPA student Richard Parker.  Richard is working in our office this year and he, along with several other students, will be contributing posts throughout the year.

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I decided to take a break from paper writing and finals studying to update the blog. This month has been long and crazy! On the 12th the SIPA Pan African Network (SPAN) hosted their annual African Diplomatic Forum. The theme was: Climate Change as the new Security Threat- Implications for Africa. Our keynote speaker was Congressman Donald Payne and we had two panels with many notable and distinguished panelists. I served as the host for the event and also the coordinator for the Human Security panel. Needless to say I was beat after it was all said and done.

The next week I had a group presentation for my Peacekeeping in Africa class which drained the rest of the energy from my body. We presented on Liberia and to our surprise one of my professors colleagues who works for the UN (at the Liberia desk of course lol) was in the audience observing the presentation.

But after that was Thanksgiving!!!! I hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving. Me and my mom did the normal turkey, stuffing, cranberry sauce etc…which is always a treat…but the rest of the holiday well let’s just say it wasn’t a holiday. On Black Friday, while most people spend hours waiting on line to get in to department stores, I spent hours online in the library writing the first of 4 (four, cuarto, quarte, quattro) 20 (twenty, vingt, venti, veinte) page papers. Only this type of thing happens at SIPA. So in true David Letterman style I present the top 10 things that only happen at SIPA (in no particular order)

10: You meet someone from a country that you can barely find on a map

9: You hear languages that Rosetta Stone doesn’t have a disk for being spoken on the 6th floor café

8: You have professors who are real life rockstars at the United Nations

7: You complain about Lehman library but never manage to study elsewhere and get mad when undergrads take all the tables in group study

6: During finals time when studying with friends, someone says they’re about to make a food run and you know that means either Hamilton’s, Sub Conscious or Appletree

5: You have a 2 minute pitch

4: You cringe at the thought of producer theory

3: Riding in the elevator with Mayor Dinkins or a visiting ambassador or head of state seems normal

2: You know the best time to go to the café in order to avoid the line

1: You study with and learn from the worlds best and brightest

So maybe not as funny if you don’t go to SIPA but it was worth a try anyway. Back to paper writing…see those of you starting in the spring in a month!

Hosting the ADF conference

Prospects for 21st Century African Agriculture

Top flight events are a mainstay at SIPA.  For some evidence, check out what is happening this Monday.  The good news is that if you wish to participate from your computer, you can.  See the end of this entry for details on how to view the event live.

Prospects for 21st Century African Agriculture

Time: Monday, 6:30 pm

Type: Discussion

Moderator(s):

Mamadou Diouf
Professor of History, Director Institute for African Studies
Committee on Global Thought
Columbia University

Speaker(s):

Kofi Annan
Former Secretary General
United Nations

Jeffrey Sachs
Director, The Earth Institute
The Earth Institute

Program Notes:

It is widely recognized that agricultural development can play a key role in eliminating hunger, reducing poverty and food insecurity, increasing trade, and promoting wealth in Africa.  However, the full potential of African agriculture is far from being realized.  Part of the 2010-2011 World and Africa Series, this panel seeks to explore the possibilities for boosting the productivity, profitability, and sustainability of African agriculture in the 21st century.  It will consider those cutting edge programs, policies, and technologies that are paving new roads forward with regard to unleashing the full potential of the continent’s agricultural economies.


Kofi Annan was the seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations, serving two terms from 1 January 1997 to 31 December 2006 and was the first to emerge from the ranks of United Nations staff. In 2001 Kofi Annan and the United Nations were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace with the citation praising his leadership for “bringing new life to the organisation”. In 2009, Annan was named a Columbia Global Fellow by University President Lee Bollinger.

Jeffrey Sachs is the Director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University. He is also Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. From 2002 to 2006, he was Director of the UN Millennium Project and Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on the Millennium Development Goals.

This event is co-sponsored with The Earth Institute.

This event can also be viewed via live webcast.

Real:

http://www.columbia.edu/acis/networks/advanced/events/live.ram

Windows Media:

http://akami.cc.columbia.edu/asxgen/wmtencoder/live.wmv.asx

"The most global public policy school, where an international community of students and faculty address world challenges."

—Merit E. Janow, Dean, SIPA, Professor of Practice, International and Economic Law and International Affairs

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