Capacity Building is a cornerstone of the EP strategic plan for a sustainable response to the HIV epidemic

in Rwanda. The EP has supported the National University of Rwanda (NUR) to establish a Rwandan HIV

Public Interest Fellowship (RHPIF) program, an executive MPH program, an SI certificate program, and a

Social Work certificate program through Tulane University's bilateral cooperative agreement with USAID

and CDC's UTAP mechanism. Additionally, support has been provided through the CAPACITY project and

Columbia University for further capacity building of nursing education and human resources management.

In FY 2008, the EP will issue an FOA to harmonize its support to GOR institutions for capacity building in

the areas of public health, social work, nursing and midwifery, medical education, and human resource

management. The awardee will be asked to work with selected Rwandan educational institutions in four

areas for the first year, with the goal to strengthen both organizational and human resource capacity in

Rwanda and to ensure that programs at participating Rwandan institutions become self-sustaining.

The first area of work will be conducted in collaboration with the NUR/SPH to continue the RHPIF program.

This program is a two-year fellowship that provides training, mentoring, and on-the-job experience with local

public or not-for-profit agencies for at least 18 individuals annually. The awarded organization will

specifically help the NUR/SPH provide professional development support and leadership to fellows,

increase the geographic distribution of fellows to agencies outside Kigali, sensitize public and not-for-profit

sectors about the contributions of public interest fellows, strengthen mentoring skills of supervisors to

ensure an adequate educational experience, manage program costs, such as stipends, and develop a

marketing program for the RHPIF to increase the number of participating host-agencies, future employers

and funding agencies. The selected organization will also be expected to work with the NUR/SPH to

convert the fellowship program into a university-recognized and accredited certificate program.

The second component will be to work with the NUR/SPH for continuation of the SI and Social Work

certificate training programs. Support for these certificate programs will focus on improved use of

appropriate teaching technologies, and building participants' skills that relate to HIV and AIDS

programming, planning, and service integration and provision. Graduate-level credit will be awarded to

allow interested participants to pursue further studies and complete an MPH if so desired.

The third aspect of work will be to provide continued support to the NUR/SPH Executive MPH Program and

support the completion of doctoral work for selected faculty members. The two-year Executive MPH

Program targets GOR staff and individuals who are actively involved in EP-supported HIV program

implementation. The program provides intensive, graduate-level training that emphasizes applied skills

through a combination of classroom and field assignments, focusing on strategic, data-driven decision

making. In addition to support for the MPH program overall, EP resources will directly support 10 MPH

students and five faculty members to complete their graduate and doctoral studies.

The fourth component will be to support pre-service medical education. The selected organization will be

asked to initiate support for undergraduate medical training and collaborate closely with the University of

Colorado in supporting post-graduate medical training. The immediate goal for FY 2008 is to assess and

devise a plan to strengthen the Rwandan medical education system. This includes developing/upgrading

the HIV/AIDS curricula in targeted departments within the Faculty of Medicine, filling faculty gaps, procuring

training equipment and covering some operational costs shared with the MOH and other donors. The

partner will also develop a clinical practicum and study tour to link pre-service and in-service training.

The awardee will work closely with CDC to link the support to the NUR/SPH with the SMDP and the FELTP.

Similarly, the awardee will work closely with the CAPACITY project to ensure training programs support

workforce planning and personnel management efforts, as well as transitioning support for nursing

education.

The aims of this activity are to strengthen institutions developing the workforce and to directly support the

education of individuals in the health care sector. These activities reflect the ideas presented in the

Rwanda EP five-year strategy and support the GOR's national strategy of human resources and

organizational capacity building.

Noted April 24, 2008: This FOA is designed to be a follow-on to existing activities, including Tulane's

support to the School of Public Health. After further analysis, it was determined that additional funding was

needed in the old Tulane mechanism in order to allow for a smooth closeout of existing activities and

transfer to this new mechanism. The money reprogrammed to the old Tulane mechanism will allow for 10

candidates in the Executive MPH Program tocomplete their degree program and will give previous cohorts

the supplementary support provided by Tulane faculty to complete their thesis requirements. Additionally, it

will allow 20 participants in the Certificate Training Program in HIV to continue to receive the only graduate-

level equivalent training currently provided in-country and it will provide previous cohorts with the

supplementary support provided by Tulane faculty to complete their research project requirements.

Capacity building is a cornerstone of the EP strategic plan for a sustainable response to the HIV/AIDS

epidemic in Rwanda. The EP has supported the National University of Rwanda (NUR) to establish a

Rwandan HIV Public Interest Fellowship (RHPIF) program, an executive MPH program, an SI certificate

program, and a Social Work certificate program through Tulane University's bilateral cooperative agreement

with USAID and CDC's UTAP mechanism. Additionally, the IHI/Capacity project and Columbia University

have provided support for additional capacity building through improvement of nursing education and

human resources management.

In FY 2008, the EP will issue an FOA to harmonize its support to GOR institutions for capacity building in

the areas of public health, social work, nursing and midwifery, medical education, and human resource

management. The awardee will be asked to work with selected Rwandan educational institutions in four

areas for the first year, with the goal to strengthen both organizational and human resource capacity in

Rwanda and to ensure that programs at participating Rwandan institutions become self-sustaining.

The first area of work will be conducted in collaboration with the NUR/SPH to continue the RHPIF program.

This program is a two-year fellowship that provides training, mentoring, and on-the-job experience with local

public or not-for-profit agencies for at least 18 individuals annually. The organization will specifically help

the NUR/SPH provide professional development support and leadership to fellows, increase the geographic

distribution of fellows to agencies outside Kigali, sensitize public and not-for-profit sectors about the

contributions of public interest fellows, strengthen mentoring skills of supervisors to ensure an adequate

educational experience, manage program costs, such as stipends, and develop a marketing program for the

RHPIF to increase the number of participating host-agencies and funding agencies. The selected

organization will also be expected to work with the NUR/SPH to convert the fellowship program into a

university-recognized and accredited certificate program.

The second component will be to work with the NUR/SPH for continuation of the SI and Social Work

certificate training programs. Support for these certificate programs will focus on improving pedagogic

techniques, using appropriate teaching technology, and building participants' skills that relate to HIV/AIDS

programming, planning, and service integration and provision. Graduate-level credit will be awarded to

allow interested participants to pursue further studies and complete an MPH, if so desired.

The third aspect of work will be to provide continued support to the NUR/SPH Executive MPH Program and

support the completion of doctoral work of selected faculty members. The 2-year Executive MPH Program

targets GOR staff and individuals who are actively involved in EP-supported HIV program implementation.

The program provides intensive, graduate-level training that emphasizes applied skills through a

combination of classroom and field assignments, focusing on strategic, data-driven, decision making. In

addition to support for the MPH program overall, EP resources will directly support 10 MPH students and

five faculty members to complete their graduate and doctoral studies.

The fourth component will be to support pre-service medical education. The selected organization will be

asked to initiate support for undergraduate medical training and collaborate closely with the University of

Colorado in supporting post-graduate medical training. The immediate goal for FY 2008 is to assess and

devise a plan to strengthen the Rwandan medical education system. This includes developing/upgrading

the HIV/AIDS curricula in targeted departments within the Faculty of Medicine, filling faculty gaps, procuring

training equipment and covering some operational costs shared with the MOH and other donors. The

partner will also develop clinical practicum and study tour to link pre-service and in-service training.

The awardee will work closely with CDC to link the support to the NUR/SPH with the SDMP and the FELTP.

Similarly, the awardee will work closely with the IHI/Capacity project to ensure training programs support

workforce planning and personnel management efforts, as well as transitioning support for nursing

education.

The aims of this activity are to strengthen institutions developing the workforce and to directly support the

education of individuals in the health care sector. These activities reflect the ideas presented in the

Rwanda EP five-year strategy and support the GOR's national strategy of human resources and

organizational capacity building.