The goal of the workshop was to advance the scientific reading, writing, mentorship and grant writing skills of Zambian researchers thereby supporting research in-country.

Fifty students including Master, Ph.D. and M.D. students, nurses, and UNZASM faculty attended.

Some of the topics covered in the workshop were:
		Critical reading of a published scientific article
		Fundamentals of scientific writing and including how to write and illustrate a scientific paper from a given data set
		Preparing and writing a grant proposal
		Organizing the students’ or faculty ideas and drafts into a proposal
		Ph.D. Student Mentorship
		download full course outline (pdf)

Lectures were given by Sylvie Le Gall, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, Zaza Ndhlovu Ph.D., Howard Hughes Institute Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the Ragon Institute, Dr. James Chipeta, Dean of Research at UNZASM as well as several UNZASM faculty members.

The workshop was championed by Zaza Ndhlovu Ph.D.  “As a Zambian researcher privileged to work at Harvard University, an institution with immense resources, I felt duty bound to make a small contribution to strengthening research capacity in Zambia,” he said.

“As a practicing scientist, I fully appreciate the role scientific reading and writing plays in being a successful research scientist and feel it is absolutely critical that up and coming Zambian scientists advance their communication skills to the extent that they can convince funding agencies that their research is worth funding.”

Like many other developing countries, Zambia generally lacks broad-based research and scientific leadership to compete for research grants and to initiate and manage research projects.  In many instances, Zambian researchers have relinquished research initiatives to collaborators in developed countries.

To be competitive, Zambian scientists require capacity support in many areas of research including project writing, grant application and research project management, contract negotiation and intellectual property rights management. 

The workshop was co-sponsored by NIH Medical Education Partnership Initiative (MEPI), Southern African Centers of Research Excellence (SACORE) Vanderbilt University AIDS International Training and Research Program(AITRP).

Dr. James Chipeta and Dr. Sylvie Le Gall co-organized the workshop.