Capacity Building in the South: Training Workshop - Policy Brief, in Kenya

Objectives of the Training Workshop

This workshop was set up to provide training in policy brief drafting and related skills.

Prior to this Policy Brief training workshop, participants were asked to complete the first course of the MOOC series "Knowledge transfer: fostering research-based practices and policies".

At the end of the training workshop, participants were able to:

understand the interest and the stakes of the Policy Brief
present their research topic in a synthetic and concise manner
know the rules of authorship/signature of scientific publications and policy briefs
write a policy brief adapted to their target audience
apply best practices for writing a policy brief
reach a lay audience
disseminate the results of their research

Team and programme

The lead trainer is Valéry Ridde (IRD researcher in public health and in knowledge transfer at the Ceped lab, and assigned to ISED/UCAD in Dakar, Senegal) in collaboration with Esthere Garnier (IRD project manager at the Capacity Building division, based in Marseille, France).

Tuesday September 20: getting to know each other, refresher course 1 MOOC Knowledge Transfer and link with the policy brief, policy briefs analysis
Wednesday September 21: target audience, scientific pitch, practical exercises to draft a policy brief, policy brief planification
Thursday September 22: draft and submission of the policy brief, critical peer-review analysis session and evaluation, authorship, predatory journals, training workshop feedback

Participants

The participants were selected with the support of the IRD representation in Kenya and researchers in the area, according to the needs of IRD's strategic partners of the South in the area. The participants are from the following countries: Kenya, Ethiopia, and Tanzania. The parity was respected with 8 women and 7 men attending the workshop.

Listen to some of them giving a feedback on the workshop in this video, and discover all the participants in the list below.
© Video by Esthere Garnier, Capacity Building division at IRD

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Safari Agure - Kenyan Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), Kenya
Gladys Bichang'a - University of Nairobi, Department of Biochemistry, Kenya
Martin Bundi - Kenyan Medical Research Institute (KEMRI), Kenya
Eunice Kamaara - MOI University, Kenya
Grace Karanja - Kenya National Commission for UNESCO (KNATCOM), Kenya
Eric Masese - MOI University, Kenya
Bahati Mayoma - University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), Tanzania
Anthony Mbatha - Kenyan Marine and Fishery Research Institute (KMFRI), Kenya
Charles Mitto Kosore - Kenyan Marine and Fishery Research Institute (KMFRI), Kenya
Titus Ndiwa - University of Nairobi, Kenya
Tirsit Sahledengin - University of Addis Ababa (UAA), Institute of Ethiopian Studies, Ethiopia
Netsebrak Tamene - University of Addis Ababa (UAA), Department of Social Anthropology, Ethiopia
William Tsaka - National Museums of Kenya (NMK), Kenya
Fatma Twahir - National Museums of Kenya (NMK), Kenya
Claire Médard - Unité de Recherche Migrations et Société (URMIS), France/Kenya

The Capacity Building division at IRD

Consolidating capabilities is a key part of all IRD missions. The aim is to consolidate a fair scientific partnership with countries in the South by training students, researchers and lecturer-researchers, technicians and engineers, and thus jointly produce excellent science devoted to sustainable development and increase the visibility of the scientific communities in the South.

These workshops allow both a sharing of expertise but also a strong interdisciplinarity that strengthens the links between different scientific fields and research networks.

Cross-cutting training workshops

These workshops intended for groups of about 15 people meet a training need expressed by IRD's partners in the South.

Beyond the primary objective of skills learning and transfer, these workshops embody moments of encounters and exchanges between people from different human, scientific and institutional cultures. In addition, the training workshops strengthen institutional relationships, as they are co-supported by partner institutions.

The training courses offered by the Capacity Building division are oriented towards cross-cutting skills, not directly towards data collection and analysis. They enable partners in the South to better position themselves in a context of international competition.