World Bank centres of excellence to be selected soon

By Maina Waruru. Phase one of the Africa Higher Education Centers of Excellence initiative, being sponsored by the World Bank to the tune of US$158 million, is expected to kick off in the third week of November when the identities of universities that have been selected to host the centres will be made public. Short-listing of proposals from applicants was completed at the end of October, when a panel tasked with selecting the beneficiary institutions was supposed to complete the task and forward the list to the World Bank for final approval.
The project, which the bank is undertaking in partnership with the Association of African Universities, or AAU, has attracted some 31 applications from participating countries, for up to 15 centres of excellence that the bank has pledged to fund under the initiative. More...