The Foundation Partnership
to Strengthen African Universities

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Making the partnership work has required a sustained effort that actively involves staff at each of the four foundations. “Recommending collaboration is easy; making it happen in practice is another story,” says Liz Levey, partnership facilitator, who works with the partnership coordinators at each of the foundations to shape and manage aspects of the project that pertain to communications and to information access and dissemination including the development of a newly launched partnership web site (www.foundation-partnership.org).

What the Future Holds
Each of the foundations has a history of grantmaking in Africa, and while each has worked with one or another on occasion, this is the first time all four have collaborated on such an ambitious project. But the effort is paying off: in just two years, the four foundations have already contributed an aggregate $62.3 million toward higher education development in the six sub-Saharan countries they focus on, more than half the $100 million they have pledged to provide over a period of five years. “It is the combination of increasingly shared strategic vision and the practical opportunities to network among partnership members that has led to an increase in grantmaking,” Andrea Johnson notes, in discussing the pace of partnership funding.

Much of the partnership’s work has been informed by case studies commissioned by the foundations, but carried out by scholars living and working in the individual countries. The resulting reports have helped to develop knowledge and consensus about the changes taking place in different universities and to inform strategic interventions for policymakers and donors. “In addition to advancing the state of knowledge about higher education in Africa,” says Joyce Moock, associate vice-president at the Rockefeller Foundation, “the case studies have helped enormously to shape the future grantmaking efforts of our individual foundations.” The studies have also helped to promote the exchange of ideas among researchers and, reports Levey, the attendance of authors at successive case study meetings has cultivated a sense of continuity and collaboration among the researchers.

Seven case studies of the six partnership countries have been completed so far. The studies have focused on specific institutions, such as the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania and Makerere University in Uganda, and the systems of higher education in Ghana, Mozambique, Nigeria and the Eastern Cape Province in South Africa. James Currey Publishers in the United Kingdom will work with publishing companies in Africa to co-publish and disseminate the case studies, which will be distributed in the next few months to philanthropic, policymaking and academic communities in the United States and Africa.

A number of the case study findings have been incorporated by their subject universities into their official strategic development objectives. “Combining the selection of local scholars to conduct the studies with a methodology that includes active feedback from the institutions involved has been very effective,” explains Levey. The completed studies have been read and vigorously discussed by policymakers from around the world, she adds. Daniel Mkude, a professor at the University of Dar es Salaam and one of the authors of the completed Dar es Salaam case study, says that even though his report has not yet been published, “It has already generated a lot of interest, both locally and internationally.” As a result, the university has been receiving visitors and written enquiries asking, “What have you done and how have you done it?” The university, too, is pleasantly surprised to find that it is suddenly the center of such attention, bolstering the spirit of the institution in its resolve to renew itself.

The studies, conferences and continued support for the development of African universities, coming at a time when their home countries face daunting challenges, including globalizing markets and the emerging role of new technologies, “places the four foundations at an historical juncture” says Ahmed Bawa. “They are now positioned to make a special impact, an historical impact, that could become the lever for deeply rooted systemic changes for the continent as a whole.”

There has also been an impact on the foundations themselves, and how they go about grantmaking. “This partnership,” says Vartan Gregorian, president of Carnegie Corporation, “is a new kind of collaboration among philanthropic institutions. In effect, it allows us to get more out of the resources we all have to invest in Africa’s human capital development.” He said that after some initial questions about the nature of the activities to be supported, the four foundations got together and decided “who could bring what to the table. We realized that even though our approaches differ, we were united in the belief that strong universities and intellectual freedom are indispensable preconditions in developing and sustaining healthy democratic societies.” This has led, says Gregorian, to “real synergy” among the foundations. “I hope this evolving model of a successful partnership in our international work will lead to more partnerships in the domestic sector,” he adds.

Building on the momentum created by their partnership, the foundations are already planning how they can work on an even wider range of concerns, including helping universities to develop their capabilities in information communications technologies, increase their access to bandwith, and expand their capacity to carry out research and contribute to knowledge about higher education in Africa. Still, the foundation leaders believe that their partnership is only one element of the support needed to bring about substantial and long-term gains for Africa’s higher education institutions. They are committed to working together to encourage other organizations and foundations to make African higher education an important part of their funding strategies.

Both the foundations and the universities involved in partnership activities believe that the work being done demonstrates the best that philanthropy has to offer by pulling together knowledge, strategies and resources, all aimed at providing universities with academic as well as practical help, enabling them to become more robust institutions, capable of launching a new generation of scholars, analysts, scientists, technologists, teachers, public servants and entrepreneurs. The foundations are confident that their investments will ultimately lead to what everyone wants: African answers to African problems.

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