The University of Nairobi Mombasa Campus launched a mentorship program that is one of its kind. They roped in professionals from the industry who will play a leading role in mentoring students. The launch was done on June 23, 2018, in Mombasa by the Vice Chancellor and DVC (Academic) Prof. Mbithi and Prof. Ogeng’o respectively where over 120 students were matched with over 80 industry professionals. The mentorship program by professionals came days after the Education Cabinet Secretary Ambassador Amina Mohammed launched the Career Services Office and urged institutions of higher learning to create linkages with industry and to help students improve on their personal brands. Well mentored students have a competitive advantage over their peers.
The annual Experiencing China Summer Program gave global exposure to two students from UoN on how China became a superpower and the role of higher education in modern China. The two students (Mary Ojwang Faculty of Arts and Mwenda Kioko of School of Engineering) were attached to Tsinghua University (best University in China) for 2 weeks “Experience China Program” where students were taken through China’s economics, politics, history, social and culture. The two students were in China for two weeks between July 14-28, 2018.
The Experiencing China 2019 Scholarship Program will be held from July 11 – 24, 2019. This is an opportunity for UoN students to join Tsinghua University in Beijing this summer to gain a window into the world of China, explore the diversity of this vast nation, to decode China’s unique situation and aspirations, and develop links with China and the world. This summer’s experiential learning program at Tsinghua helps to sharpen student’s global vision and foster vital leadership skills for the future.
The course is made of 7 key tracks as listed below. Each track will be led by an academic tutor for in-depth exploration.
- Architecture
- Creative City
- Environment
- International Relations
- Industry Frontiers
- Urbanization
- Gender
The Arava International Centre for Agricultural Training (AICAT) Open Day was held from 27th Jan 2019 to 1st Feb 2019 in Israel. The Dean Agriculture, Prof. George Chemining’wa and Ms. Ann Nkoidila from the Advancement Office attended the open day.
The purpose of the Open Day is to tour the different farm sites where students are attached to and get a feel of the kind of hands-on agricultural farming experience they are receiving. UoN sent 15 students to Israel for the 2nd cohort in June 2018 and they are bound to return home after their 11 months training in July 2019.
- AICAT Cohort III applications
Based on the five-year Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the Government of Kenya and the State of Israel, UoN is expected to send two more cohorts of students to Israel (2019/2020). The 2019 selection will be the third cohort of students to be sent to Israel in July 2019.
“University of Nairobi can provide leadership in Universal Health Coverage. The University is a nice place to help the President accomplish these programs as they are involved in agriculture, engineering and training of health professionals” speaking during the launch of the Nairobi Innovation Week 2019, Prof Magoha challenged Universities to publish more, conduct more research and come up with innovations that will be key in helping the President achieve his flagship agenda of affordable housing, manufacturing, universal healthcare and food security. He challenged professors in various fields related to the big four agenda to work closely with students to help them innovate.
A briefing session was held at the College of Agriculture and Veterinary Sciences (CAVs) on January 16 Over 70 students attended the briefing session. The purpose of this session was to inform Agricultural students in CAVs about the opportunity and to clarify the eligibility criteria. After the briefing session on the AICAT program, eligible students were given registration forms.
Over 100 applications were received by the Dean, Agriculture who gave his recommendation and submitted to the Office of Career Services for further review. 30 students were shortlisted based on the merit criteria and interviewed by the AICAT Officials on April 1, 2019
The successful candidates will be taken through an orientation process and go through a medical exam before they can be finally cleared to travel to Israel for the 11 months ‘Learning by Doing’ program sometime in June 2019.
The University of Nairobi ICT department in collaboration with the Advancement Office and Huawei offered the Huawei Certified Network Associate (HCNA) certification training to 25 UoN students and staff from 5th – 30th November 2018. This is just the beginning of a series of training that will seek to validate the skills and knowledge networking professionals require for basic maintenance and configuration of small to medium-sized networks.
The training covered Ethernet technologies such as Link Aggregations, VLAN, RSTP and STP and their implementation on Huawei switches, TCP/IP technologies, and basic IP network connectivity. With the HCNA certification, trainees are expected to demonstrate, design and implement a basic understanding of small and medium-sized networks and this includes general network technologies.
Engineers who have HCNA certification are expected to develop simple networks then integrate storage, security, cloud, voice and wireless technologies into these networks so that they can support a wide range of applications.
Huawei launched the HCNA Training and Certification based on its many years of experience in developing great insight into ICT industry developments and ICT talents. The University of Nairobi is proud to partner with Huawei in building the ICT Skills of staff and students and looks forward to a fruitful collaboration with Huawei.
Huawei also sponsored the “Huawei ICT Competition Southern Africa 2018-2019” on November 21 in which UoN students participated. The second runners up, Wanjohi Gachoki came from UoN outdoing over 4,000 participants from over 40 Universities in Kenya. The competition focused on computer telecommunications and networking and was tailored to create a platform for ICT students to grasp practical and technical skills and learn on top range ICT career certifications globally for them to align their careers and tap into opportunities in leading ICT companies.
During the Huawei ICT competition awards ceremony held on November 26, 2018, UoN was awarded the ‘Best ICT Academy in the Huawei ICT Competition’ award and George Ndegwa from the UoN ICT Department won the ‘Best Lecturer in the Huawei ICT Competition’ award.
“With the launch of the handbook on the establishment of the Offices of Career Services all universities and tertiary institutions must set up the office which should be up and running by the end of the year,” announced Cabinet Secretary for Education, Amb. Amina Mohamed.
Cheques received were from Barclays which sponsored Kshs. 2M, KENIC – Kshs 1M and University of Nairobi Alumni Association (UONAA), Kshs. 500,000
Barclays, as part of the ABSA group, have been partners of the NIW since the first year. Filbert July, from Barclays, said, “We have been sponsors of the NIW because we believe that when we grow our youth, we partner with our economy.
On his part, University of Nairobi Alumni Association (UONAA), Director, Mr. Ken Sawe noted that the Association recognizes the importance of innovation and businesses in the nation’s development
The Nairobi Innovation Challenge has been running for 4 months; 6 start-ups were unveiled from the 30 that participated in the competition. From the 6 start-ups a winner will be chosen and awarded using what most sponsors have given; some monetary and others incubation, domain name, and domain hosting, gift hampers just to mention but a few.
61 start-ups and 26 enablers from the Ministry of Trade will be exhibiting in this year’s Innovation week and the youth from all counties will be trained through the Ideation to commercialization seminar.
To match the rest of the world in the advancement of technology and the job market, the University of Nairobi through the Office of Career Services (OCS) is building sustainable partnerships with industry partners in a bid to produce high quality, industry-oriented students. Through its apprenticeship program, the OCS Office enables potential employers to identify prospective employees from the University. The process also enables the University to understand the employers’ future workforce needs, identify skills gap and offer training programs through apprenticeships.
Students drawn from the School of Engineering and School of Computing and Informatics visited the Huawei Kenya Head Office in Lavington on Tuesday, June 4, 2019, for an Industrial site visit aimed at getting the first-hand experience on how a networking and telecommunication industry works.
Huawei has been partnering with UoN through its ICT Academy program in offering training to students and staff for the HCIA Routing and Switching Training Certification which validates the knowledge and skills required for basic configuration and maintenance of small to medium-sized networks. UoN has also partnered with Huawei in its Graduate Trainee Program since 2017, Huawei Campus Ambassador program with two students being selected to be Huawei Ambassadors, Huawei Job Fair, and Seeds for the Future program.
UoN students also participated in the 2018-2019 Huawei ICT Competition and one of the top three students in the global final from Kenya Mwai Moses is an Alumnus of UoN and now a Huawei Engineer.
In support of the ICT Academy partnership with UoN, Huawei donated equipment worth KES 5,000,000 for the training center at UoN in 2019. The OCS office is glad to partner with Huawei in skilling students for the ICT job market.
Industrial Site Visit To Huawei
The Office of Career Services participated in a Career Day Programme at Lenana School on Saturday, May 18, 2019. The theme of the event was “Exposing learners to future career opportunities”. The Director, Career Services attended the event and gave a talk to the students on career pathways and skills for the 21st century that employers are now looking out for in potential employees.
There were career talks given by other professionals in different career fields such as Architecture, Engineering, Medicine, Law, Entrepreneurship & Commerce, Journalism & Media, Arts, Sports & Talents, Technology, ICT, Artificial Intelligence & Robotics and Aviation & Airspace Technology.
High School Career Mentoring and Recruitment is one of the core mandates of the Office of Career Services and UoN is keen on mentoring high school students for them to make their career goals before transitioning to University/College.