Workshops and Conferences

In view of organizing the first ‘VLIR-UOS Ugandan Dissemination Conference’ at MUST on 26 and 27 January 2017, the Flemish coordinator invited all relevant Flemish PI’s of the past and currently operational VLIR-UOS projects (in Uganda) to a Flemish steering Committee meeting at the offices of VLIR-UOS in Brussels. This eventually took place on 19 October 2016. The main issues discussed were the planned organization of a dissemination conference, the vision & long term perspective of the VLIR-UOS towards the platform and update on the outcome of the HEFS calls. In the end, due to a combination of factors, the Joint Steering Committee and Dissemination Conference is postponed to a later date in 2017.

The Ugandan Steering Committee meeting that had been planned to sit in August 2016 at Mbarara University of Science and Technology did not take place. It was not possible due to the fact that some of the partner public universities like Makerere, Kyambogo, Gulu and Busitema were on strike. Coupled with that, it was not yet clear at that time about the closure of the Governance Platform, which made organizing the Ugandan Steering Committee complicated. That is why the Platform Coordinator convened a MUST PIs meeting that sat on August 23, 2016 in the Deputy Vice Chancellor’s Office to kick start the planning process for the dissemination workshop, initially scheduled 26-27January 2017 at Mbarara University of Science and Technology.

The core objective of a Joint Steering Committee is to get all project leaders (both South and North) together and discuss and agree upon the direction of the Platform(s). The JSCM was held on 22nd March 2016 at Bomah Hotel in Gulu, a day after the Governance dissemination workshop on 21st March 2016. This was Prof. Tushabomwe-Kazooba’s, and Mrs. Aliguma's, the new platform manager, first official HEFS event. The JSC meeting was attended by 19 members from both HEFS and Governance Platforms. They included the HEFS Flemish Platform Coordinator and Programme Manager, the external Evaluator, HEFS Platform Ugandan Coordinator and programme Manager, the Governance Platform Ugandan Coordinator, members from Gulu University, Mbarara University Mountains of the Moon University, Uganda Christian University, Busitema University, Makerere University, Kyambogo University and Gulu University that hosted the two events.

The Flemish Steering Committee Meeting took place on 19 November 2015, whereby a total of 10 representatives of Universiteit Antwerpen, IOB, Ugent, VUB, Mbarara University and VLIR were present. VLIR-UOS took the opportunity to address the new legislative framework within the new law on Development cooperation, with special attention to the administrative and financial changes in the coming operational years.

All members present highlighted their progress and/or identified activities planned, as well as the possibility of presenting research outcomes in workshops, supported by the HEFS Platform. The latter then presented an overview of the scheduled activities of the Platform for the AP2016, with the headline a Joint Steering Committee to be held before the end of the operational year (31/3/16). Last but not least, VLIR-UOS informed the Platform members of the foreseen evaluation of the concept of the platform in the course of 2016. The two Ugandan platforms (Health and Governance) operated as concept pilots.

The Uganda steering committee meeting took place on October 10, 2014; it had in attendance 12 participants from the various partner Universities in Uganda. The meeting aimed to review the past year performance and plan for the coming year. Some of the issues that formed the discussion included brainstorming on how best the Platform can translate research into practice. Some members present suggested a Harvest call targeting translation of results into policy. It was also suggested that supervision and guidance skills were lacking within project teams besides low research capacity to respond to calls for abstracts; thus the need to train and build local capacity.

Essential during the Ugandan steering committee meeting was the announcement of developments of the Harvest call 2014. The Platform coordinators presented the selection criteria, an overview of the applicants by university and an overview of the pre-selected candidates. An important decision regarding the Calls was to change the name in 2015: ‘Harvest Call’ becomes “Grant Completion Call” .

The Flemish Steering Committee Meeting took place on 24 October 2014, whereby representatives of Universiteit Antwerpen, IOB, Ugent and VLIR were present. Next to an overview of activities in year 1, a follow up on the Ugandan Steering Committee Meeting earlier that month and the progress of rewarded scholars of the Harvest Call 2013, the Project coordinator highlighted the developments in the selection process of the Harvest Call 2014. Next to that, the state of play in the projects within the Platform was presented. Like was the case in the USCM, the stakeholders of the FSCM were asked for input and ideas regarding the organization of a thematic workshop or dissemination conference later in the year.

On 14th April 2014, a one day workshop was hosted by the Infectious Diseases Institute, Makerere University, Kampala, to prepare a request for funding from the Belgo-Ugandan Study and Consultancy Fund to carry out the necessary research to determine the cause of nodding syndrome (NS) and to identify ways of preventing the occurrence of new NS cases.

After the presentation and brainstorm session, it was decided that different participating institutions would lead different areas of research (epidemiology, pathology,  Entomology-virology and patient care). IDI  is a candidate to do most of the coordination work with the Ministry of Health. The MoH will lead the entire process and will request all the partners for information on the different areas of study. Finally, all the institutions will make a significant contribution to evidence based medicine to affect policy and clinical practice to improve treatment of NS.