With the world's largest refugee camps located in Dadaab and Kakuma, Northern Kenya, the refugee and immigration crisis remains a critical issue, particularly in Eastern and Northern Africa. Columbia Global Centers | Nairobi is committed to addressing these challenges by providing a platform for meaningful dialogue and collaborative solutions. Our efforts are aligned with Columbia University's broader mission to engage with pressing global issues. Through our initiatives, we explore various aspects of migration, including forced displacement, human trafficking, refugee law, economic migration, labor mobility, labor rights, and human development. By fostering these discussions, we aim to contribute to informed policy-making and sustainable interventions that benefit migrants and host communities.
The 'Building Resilience in Crisis through Education' (BRICE) Program.
In a consortium headed by Oxfam IBIS consisting of global, regional and national partners and including members from Oxfam in South Sudan, Uganda and Oxfam Novib, AVSI, FAWEU, UNATU, Luigi Giussani Institute for Higher Education and the Community Development Initiative, as well as the international teacher trade union Education International and CGC | Nairobi/Columbia University Teachers’ College as a research partner, BRICE aimed at building the resilience of learners, teachers and education systems by providing education to 31,150 youth in more than 22 schools in South Sudan and Northern Uganda.
Columbia Global Emerging Scholars
In December 2023, Columbia Global was awarded a grant by the Mellon Foundation to support its fellowship for displaced scholars in the humanities for three years. Every year, 10 early-career fellows with displaced/refugee status will be hosted at three Global Centers—Amman, Nairobi, and Santiago—with programs to strengthen their research skills and professional networks, and ultimately position them for successful academic careers. The Fellowship program builds on and learns from the highly effective Mellon-funded Emerging Displaced Scholars Fellowship pilot program at the Columbia Global Center in Amman, Jordan, from 2020 to 2023.
Support mechanisms for Fellows include the following:
- Linking Fellows to academics, practitioners and experts across the Columbia Global Center network;
- Matching each Fellow with a Columbia faculty member to provide mentorship, advice and support;
- Providing access to online courses at Columbia University and customized training workshops to build the academic capacity of incoming fellows;
- Facilitating hands-on learning opportunities in program administration and implementation;
- Assisting Fellows in convening roundtable discussions, conferences and talks in their respective subject areas;
- Enabling Fellows to embark on their academic pursuits in a safe environment; and
- Highlighting Fellows’ publications and other intellectual endeavours by disseminating their work and facilitating exchange through the Global Center network and Columbia University at large.
- At the end of the year-long fellowship, Fellows will be expected to make a public presentation of the work they have produced during the fellowship year.