From community work to enhanced impact through research and teaching
Assimwe JoyTu
Assimwe JoyTu from Uganda Christian University shares her story into doctoral research. Initially working in the community and developing projects that address children poverty, she then started her lecturing career teaching project planning and management.
About Assimwe
Doing a PhD in Uganda is not something you are likely to move into straight after your Bachelor degree or even a Master. It may take many years of professional practice before being in a context where your personal and professional situation make such undertaking a feasible step. Asiimwe had the opportunity to do a Masters degree in the Netherland and enjoyed greatly the experience of meeting people from all over the world. It then took a long time for Asiimwe to be able to join a PhD programme. She is now enjoying her PhD journey.
Asiimwe is fully aware that the resources available for researchers in Uganda will be very different than in other more affluent contexts. She stresses that when researchers are seeking opportunities for PhD, they may want to seek environments where they know they will be supported.
Words of wisdom
o Asking for help when we need to work differently
o Asking others so that the PhD journey is not a lonely one
o Appreciating how others are going about their research approach
o Contextualising your research in our own community because the ideas which come from elsewhere may not be very much appreciated here
o Creating a timeframe to structure your writing pipeline- in her case, conference papers have helped her to motivate her academic writing.
“There is so much knowledge and the horizon keeps growing and growing”
