Following the success of the First Edition of the “Kenya Day” on March 22th 2019, the French Embassy in Kenya, together with Campus France, the main operator for French university mobility, organized a Second Edition on June, 4th 2019 at Campus France in Paris.
This event took place in the context of the Franco-Kenyan roadmap on university, innovation and professional training partnerships, signed during the visit of French President Emmanuel Macron in Kenya on March 13th and 14th 2019. (https://ke.ambafrance.org/Visite-d-Etat-du-President-de-la-Republique-au-Kenya-13-14-mars-2019-vers-plus). This historical event – the first visit of a French President in Kenya since its independence in 1963 – gave Emmanuel Macron the opportunity to reassert the necessity to strengthen university partnerships and research along with innovation development in order to increase the number of Kenyan studying in France and French students mobility to Kenya.
The Second Edition – on the theme of Technical and Professional Training – met French academic actors, scientific actors and companies’ increased interests for the country as well as the Kenyan Government expectations to develop skills-based training that would cater the recruitment need of trained engineers both in secondary school and in higher education.
The day has been structured around conferences driven by private and public sector professionals and concluded by individual institutional meetings between French and Kenyan institutions, in the light of consolidating current partnerships and build up new ones.
As special guests, were present Mr. Kevit DESAI, Principal Secretary TVET, Kenyan Ministry of Education, Mrs. Aline KUSTER-MENAGER, French Ambassador in Kenya and Somalia, Mrs. Judy WAKHUNGU, Kenyan Ambassador in France and previous Cabinet Secretary for the Ministry of Environment and Forestry. A Kenyan academic delegation composed of 8 higher education institutions’ representatives, 23 French institutions and companies constituted the public of the day.
This event is directly followed by the launching of the France Alumni – Kenya platform, local branch of the network France Alumni that gather more than 200 000 former French higher education students on June, 18th 2019 in Nairobi. On one hand, this platform rally and inform graduates of the French education system and, on the other hand, provide to the hundred French companies located in Kenya an excellent exchange and recruitment tool. The launching of the France Alumni-Kenya platform will be celebrated with a gala evening bringing together alumni, representatives of the government, companies and Scholars at the French Embassy’s Residency.
