Dr. Aklilu Zeleke selected as 2024 COIL Faculty Fellow

December 12, 2023

Dr. Aklilu Zeleke, mathematics professor in Lyman Briggs College and the MSU Department of Statistics and Probability, was recently selected to collaborate on a collaborative online international learning project in Africa, through the COIL Faculty Fellows Program-Africa.

Zeleke and Fydess Khundi-Mkomba, faculty member and lecturer of agricultural & applied economics within the Faculty of Development Studies at the Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR), will provide a space for their students to share and critically reflect upon research ideas in relation to Global North and Global South discourses within health, agri-food, and/or environmental sciences.

Sponsored by the Alliance for African Partnership, the COIL program is an opportunity for higher-ed teaching faculty (i.e., faculty or academic staff with teaching appointments) from any discipline to explore the theory and practice of Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) through global partnerships connecting AAP Consortium institutions.

Almost 30 highly esteemed teaching faculty expressed interest in this fellowship program and the selection committee was so impressed by the quality of all the team applications received that seven teams were selected, rather than six teams as initially planned.

Through COILed projects scheduled to run in 2024, MSU fellows representing the Broad College of Business, College of Agriculture & Natural Resources, College of Arts & Letters, College of Natural Science, College of Osteopathic Medicine, and Lyman Briggs College will collaborate with African fellows from Egerton University (Kenya), Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (Malawi), Makerere University (Uganda), and University of Nigeria Nsukka (Nigeria).

By making global learning accessible to their students and actively engaging in intercultural exchanges, Zeleke and Khundi-Mkomba will help advance internationalization plans and strengthen ties between both Lyman Briggs College and the College of Natural Science and Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR).

View the official announcement on Global Youth Advancement Network website for more information, and stay tuned to GYAN's COIL webpage as a second call for fellows will open in the near future.

The COIL project is a partnership between the Global Youth Advancement Network, the Alliance for African Partnership, and the Office for Education Abroad.