: Reminder: Call for participation: 2013 MyCOE / SERVIR Initiative in West Africa for Undergraduate and Graduate Students

[muchiri christopher]

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From: My Community Our Earth <my...@aag.org>
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Sent: Wednesday, March 27, 2013 12:19 AM
Subject: Reminder: Call for participation: 2013 MyCOE / SERVIR Initiative in West Africa for Undergraduate and Graduate Students

Call for participation: 2013 MyCOE / SERVIR Initiative in West Africa for Undergraduate and Graduate Students

DEADLINE is APRIL 30, 2013

See www.aag.org/mycoe.servir/westafrica

The MyCOE / SERVIR Initiative in West Africa is a 10-month fellowship program for undergraduate and graduate students in eligible countries* who are currently enrolled in any field at an institution of higher education in an eligible country with ideas and plans for research that address themes of Women in Climate Change and Food Security using geographic technologies. Students are invited to propose a research and outreach project and will be competitively selected on the basis of their long-term potential to contribute to these topics in the region. 

The program is particularly interested in receiving applications demonstrating linkages across Three Generations of Women in Climate Change and Food Security.   The program will connect teams of emerging researchers and their mentors with international pioneering female scientists and experts in climate change for inspiration and guidance.  In turn, the most competitive MyCOE fellows' outreach activities proposed should include an integral educational component that reaches out to young girls in their countries, encouraged to consider careers in science.  Selected teams may stimulate the interest of young girls by engaging them in their research and by sharing experience in secondary (preferred) or middle school level classrooms with which they propose to engage.  Thus, this program will advance women’s participation and contribution to Climate Change in Africa by linking three generations: pioneer female scientists/mentors, university student fellows, and young girls in middle or secondary school.

The MyCOE / SERVIR program will provide students with customized capacity training in GIS, remote sensing, GPS, and/or spatial techniques to help them enrich their research proposals. They will also receive professional development, have access to additional mentoring by international experts and engage in an online community with other fellows. Interested students must apply with a mentor who is willing to work closely with them throughout the duration of the program and attend the workshop. The program provides travel support and research stipends for both students and their mentors.

Up to 15 teams of students and their mentors will be selected for this West Africa Initiative.  Over the life of the program, participants will have the opportunity to interact and exchange ideas with approximately 60 other teams from around the world that will be selected through MyCOE / SERVIR global initiatives. The official language for this initiative is English. 

Partners: My Community, Our Earth: Geographic Learning for Sustainable Development (MyCOE), Association of American Geographers (AAG) (MyCOE Secretariat); National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), United States Agency for International Development (USAID), The SERVIR Global Program; Esri; Center for Remote Sensing and Geographic Information Services (CERSGIS) in Accra, Ghana, and others.

*Eligible Countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroun, Chad, Cote d'Ivorie, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo

Please note that to be eligible, all participants must be  citizens of one of the eligible countries AND also be studying (students) or working (mentors) and residing in the same or another of the eligible countries.  Gender of applicants or mentors is not a consideration for selection, and female and male students are encouraged to apply according to the focus of this call for participation.

For more information please see http://www.aag.org/mycoe.servir/westafrica

Inquiries may be directed to my...@aag.org