In May 2022, Kent State University’s Board of Trustees approved forming a nonprofit corporation to be housed at the University of Rwanda in Kigali (Rwanda’s capital and largest city) to serve as Kent State’s base of operations for all of Africa.
Why Rwanda?
The real question, says Marcello Fantoni, PhD, Kent State’s vice president for global education, is not “Why Rwanda?” but rather, “Why Africa?”
Reasons for a Kent State presence in Africa
There are two main reasons for Kent State to establish a presence in Africa, Fantoni explains—one practical, the second more idealistic.
First, Kent State needs to find new markets for students both at home and internationally, he says. The population of traditional college-age students is declining in Northeast Ohio and throughout the United States. The university is always scanning the globe for emerging markets and these days that means looking to Africa. The educational systems of the developing continent cannot keep up with the growing demand for higher education from its burgeoning populations, whether in Nigeria, Ghana or other African nations.
“It’s almost the perfect star alignment,” Fantoni says.
The new base of operations in Kigali will give the university its first permanent presence on the African continent, and already has opened the door for a multitude of programs and exchanges between Kent State University and the University of Rwanda (UR).
Most notable is a group of 12 students, sponsored by the Rwandan government, who arrived on the Kent Campus for Fall Semester 2022 to begin their undergraduate studies, mostly in computer science or engineering.
The second reason for a presence in Africa, Fantoni says, lies at the heart of Kent State’s global mission. Kent State has an extensive global presence, from its campus in Florence, Italy, which this year celebrates its 50th anniversary, to educational programs and exchanges in Brazil, France, South Korea and dozens of other countries.
“Yet the vast majority of our students going abroad still choose Western Europe,” Fantoni says. Kent State needs to provide its students and faculty with the opportunity for a robust and complete global exchange, he says, which necessitates the move into Africa.
“It’s a matter of us providing students with more opportunities, in particular in sub-Saharan Africa.”
Marcello Fantoni, PhD, vice president for global education
“It’s a matter of us providing students with more opportunities, in particular in sub-Saharan Africa,” Fantoni says. Those include opportunities for Kent State students to understand the importance of Africa in world politics and opportunities for African students to gain a U.S. education.
According to the most recent data from Open Doors, a U.S. survey of international exchange activity, 42,518 students (undergraduate, graduate, non-degree and optional practical training) from sub-Saharan African countries studied in the United States in academic year 2021-2022. The United Nations predicts that Africa will be the fastest-growing continent by 2050, doubling in population and accounting for more than half the world’s population growth.
But of all the African nations, what made Rwanda—a Central African nation about a quarter the size of Ohio—such a favorable location for Kent State?
Perhaps this is where the stars truly align.
A Rwandan student comes to Kent State
Rwanda is known in recent history for the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi that wiped out nearly 1 million citizens. The bloody massacre, provoked by members of the Hutu majority government, pitted neighbors against each other and left the country in a humanitarian crisis. Since that time, Rwanda has made tremendous progress and now boasts social indicators (educational attainment, life expectancy, gross domestic product, etc.) that exceed those of other nations in the region.
In 2011, Pacifique Niyonzima, a young Rwandan student and a genocide survivor, came to Hudson, Ohio, to live with a sponsor family, Mike and Jill Burke, who had volunteered to pay for his education. Niyonzima, whose first name means “peacemaker” in French, earned a bachelor’s degree from Walsh University, in Canton, before enrolling at Kent State to pursue a master’s degree in higher education administration with a focus on internationalization.
As part of his master’s program, Niyonzima returned to Rwanda in summer 2018 to intern in the office of the vice chancellor at the University of Rwanda. He saw how his nation had been transformed in the years he was away and how the government had committed to using education to promote peace and gender equality.
“Nobody could believe Rwanda [after the genocide] would be a country again but see where Rwanda is today!”
Pacifique Niyonzima, MEd ’19
“Nobody could believe Rwanda [after the genocide] would be a country again but see where Rwanda is today!” he says. “It’s the safest country in Africa, the No. 1 country in the world for gender equity. Rwanda has the highest number of women in employment and women representation in government. It’s one of the top countries that sends peacekeepers to other countries. That happens because of peace and leadership, and the young people are wanting to be part of this ongoing movement.”
Niyonzima, who earned a master’s degree in higher education administration from Kent State in 2019, is now a graduate assistant in the College of Education, Health and Human Services (EHHS) working toward a doctorate degree in interprofessional leadership. And he has used his connections at Kent State to promote Rwanda, specifically the University of Rwanda.
In every conversation regarding Kent State and Rwanda, Niyonzima’s name is certain to come up, and his enthusiasm is infectious as he serves as head cheerleader for his native land.
Joanne Caniglia, PhD, a professor in EHHS, refers to Niyonzima as “the future president of Rwanda,” recognizing the extensive diplomatic effort and promotion he has devoted to developing the partnership between Kent State and UR.
She first met Niyonzima at a wedding, and before the event was over had learned of a collaboration between the Rwandan Ministry of Education and Kent State, which he had initiated.
Niyonzima told Caniglia, who specializes in training future math teachers, of the Ministry of Education’s desire to improve math education across Rwanda.
In spring 2022, Caniglia and Davison Mupinga, PhD, also a professor in EHHS, who specializes in training career and technical education teachers, made a 10-day visit to Rwanda. They met with officials from UR and the Ministry of Education and began plans for collaboration on math education.
A recent World Bank study, Caniglia says, notes that teaching mathematics to the world, and especially to Africa, is the most important thing you can do. “With math, everything opens up—technology, science,” she says.
Both Caniglia and Mupinga had been involved in Kent State’s previous efforts to promote collaboration in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country and its most notable democracy. Those efforts, however, have stalled due to safety concerns from conflicts that threaten the stability of the nation.
Fantoni was open to considering other African countries and was willing to listen when Niyonzima suggested Kent State explore a relationship with the University of Rwanda.
Niyonzima is proud of the matchmaker role he played between the two universities. He says he was struck from the beginning about the parallels between the two schools: “They’re both research universities, both public, and the structure is very similar.”
Shared perspective
Kent State’s history with the May 4, 1970, shootings and Rwanda’s history of genocide give each university a unique perspective on the effects of violence, albeit on different scales. And both have developed programs in response: Kent State has its School for Peace and Conflict Studies and the University of Rwanda has its Centre for Conflict Management.
Despite the pandemic, Fantoni was able to visit UR in 2021 with a small delegation that included R. Neil Cooper, PhD, director of the School of Peace and Conflict Studies, and Niyonzima.
Rwanda, Fantoni says, was the right fit for many reasons: its geographical position in Central Africa, the safety of the country and the ability for Kent State to operate there without complicated rules and governmental red tape. But the universities’ mutual dedication to peace and conflict studies ultimately made Rwanda the right choice for Kent State’s base in Africa.
The trustees’ action calls for Kent State to establish a nonprofit Community Benefit Company in Rwanda, which will enable a staff presence to recruit students from across the African continent and to look for other African partnerships.
Fantoni credits UR and the Rwandan government for embracing the opportunity for a mutually beneficial relationship. “They really want this,” he says, “Not only were we at the right place at the right time, but we also got support that was practically relevant and politically meaningful. And Kent State’s projects in Rwanda have been supported and facilitated by the Rwandan embassy in Washington, D.C.”
Other programs and plans
In addition to the 12 undergraduate students sponsored by the Rwandan government, Fantoni is working on a similar arrangement with the National Police Academy of Rwanda, which may send its officers to Kent State for graduate degrees. Most of the students seeking degrees and advanced degrees at Kent State will be studying computer science, engineering and aeronautics, he says.
As part of an effort to turn Kigali into an aviation hub, the Rwandan government is building an international airport. The University of Rwanda, through its College of Science and Technology, is aiming to build a program to train pilots and others involved in aeronautics and aerospace engineering to meet the needs of Rwanda’s growing aviation industry. So, an exchange program with the College of Aeronautics and Engineering is also being discussed.
Fantoni hopes the collaboration eventually will produce a formal partnership or an American Academy, like the dual-enrollment program now offered jointly by Kent State and the Pontifical Catholic University of Paraná (PUCPR), in Curitiba, Paraná, Brazil. The academy allows students to take Kent State courses for two years in Brazil, and then finish a bachelor’s degree at either PUCPR or at Kent State.
Niyonzima and Sarah Schmidt, assistant director of global education initiatives in the Office of Global Education Initiatives at Kent State’s Stark Campus and an instructor of peace and conflict studies, took a contingent of students to Rwanda over summer 2022 for a study abroad program, and are planning another trip for summer 2023. Efforts to get more Kent State students into Africa already are bearing fruit.
Partners in peace education
Academically, the first joint effort between the two schools—a dual master’s degree in Peace and Conflict Studies—also is nearing completion.
R. Neil Cooper has been working to develop the program with Aggée Shyaka Mugabe, director of UR’s Centre for Conflict Management. The master’s program, Cooper says, is going through the approval process and will include an exchange of students who wish to pursue the degree.
Mugabe spent the summer at Kent State as a visiting scholar, and his visit sparked involvement in another large effort scheduled for summer 2023. The two universities are jointly hosting an international academic conference, “Peace Education in an Era of Crisis,” in Kigali from July 11 to 14. Kent State’s Gerald H. Read Center for International and Intercultural Education, within the college of EHHS, also is a partner in the conference.
Through its determination to recover from its genocide, Rwanda has embedded peace education in every course at every grade level in its educational system, Cooper says, which made Rwanda the perfect location for the conference. “It’s an interesting model and an example of a country that has really tried to mainstream and adopt peace education.”
“It’s an interesting model and an example of a country that has really tried to mainstream and adopt peace education.”
R. Neil Cooper, PhD, director of Kent State’s School of Peace and Conflict Studies
Amanda Johnson, PhD, director of the Read Center, says one of her roles is to encourage engagement in international initiatives within EHHS in order to graduate educators with a broad world view. Johnson says she was eager to collaborate on the conference and involve the Read Center in a broader scope of issues, including peace studies, colonialism and race relations.
Recently the Aegis Trust, an international organization based in Rwanda that works to prevent genocide and mass atrocities worldwide, signed on to co-sponsor the conference, which is currently accepting submissions for proposals for presenters.
Johnson is searching for funding and hopes to be able to take 10 or 12 teachers from Northeast Ohio to the conference. “We need the practice of peace education within our school systems and communities,” she says.
When Pacifique Niyonzima considers all the collaboration that has taken place between Kent State and the University of Rwanda in just a few short years, he thinks back on his studies for his own master’s program.
“I was focusing on the United States and Africa and especially Rwanda, with it being my country,” he says. “I wanted to see how Rwanda and the United States could work together to enhance the education system to benefit both. So that was my big vision—and now I can see that happening.”
