The School of Graduate Studies was launched in September 2017 with the mandate to provide a one stop shop for all graduate students. Our support extends to supporting research that leads to a more diverse and inclusive scholarly community. The School oversees graduate programs, partnerships with other universities and industry, research opportunities and funding, upcoming conferences and workshops, colloquia and scholarships for graduate research. The University's refreshed research and enterprise strategy together with the supporting administrative plan sets the commitment to fostering a culture and understanding of research integrity to staff, faculty and students.
Under Graduate Studies, the school ensures standardization of all graduate programs, encourages collaboration amongst the graduate programs, oversees implementation processes and quality checks, fundraises for graduate programs provides the criteria for admission of graduate students, manages comprehensive examinations, oversees internal and external examination of theses and reviews students’ graduation requirements before approval by the senate. The school also offers training services to students, staff and faculty on applied research (proposal development, research methodology, publishing and dissemination of research output). With regard to Research and Extension, the school’s mandate is to link the university with the industry by offering value add support to industry. It also offers internal grants to USIU-Africa Faculty through a competitive process
In light of COVID-19 Pandemic, the School partnered with the University of Saint Mary Kansas to host an online webinar with a view to; compare areas of similarities between both universities, compare the different areas and lastly areas of convergence. The webinar whose agenda was “How Students are coping with the COVID-19 Pandemic”. Both universities shared on; (a) National - curfew and quarantine zones in Kenya and the high death rate and infections in the US, (b) Academics - challenges of new learning environments (online or other formats); class schedules and post-graduation lastly (c) Social Life - family and friends. Additionally, the School has hosted free online SME and Agribusiness Webinars with a view to provide a platform for participants to share their survival tactics during these uncertain times. Most recently, USIU-Africa’s School of Science and Technology partnered with our School to offer a no-cost digital service to help SMEs to transition to a digital revenue or operating model. Each project is done by a team of student volunteers under the guidance of a mentor. The focus of the initiative is to quickly solve one technology problem or provide one new online capability to the SME.
The School of Graduate Studies, Research and Extension has marked many notable accomplishments which include but not limited to the launch of the Institute of Higher Education Research, Leadership and Development (IHERLD), the Lean Launchpad, Narendra Raval Entrepreneurship and Social Innovation Program, Students Research Club, Global Agribusiness Management and Entrepreneurship (GAME) Center, the Network of Impact Evaluation Researchers in Africa (NIERA), ABSA (former Barclays) SME Academy and the Innovation and Incubation Center. The School is among those selected to implement the Kenya Youth Employment Opportunities Program (KYEOP) focusing on Nyandarua, Nakuru, Kitui, Nairobi, Machakos and Kiambu Counties. KYEOP seeks to build capacity of over 35,000 youth from 2018 to 2021. The trainings conducted in KYEOP covers life skills to enable youth take responsibilities for their lives, actions, change their mindset to be ready for training on technical skills (vocational) and entrepreneurship These research initiatives are designed to address the acute need for greater diversity with the professoriate, creation of a robust profile of USIU-Africa’s research as well as full alignment to the strategic plan 2020-2025.
Prof. Patrick Wamuyu,
Dean, School of Graduate Studies
