Program News Archives - Page 5 of 6 - Harvard Ministerial Leadership Program

What makes an effective minister?

June 6, 2023March 18, 2019 by bdugan

The role of ministers of education and health is pivotal to developing the human capital essential for sustainable economic development. These sectors together usually account for the lion’s share of the national budget, they are often the largest employers, and they provide critical frontline public services. Yet the global commitment to universal education and health … Read more

Harvard Ministerial Program Supports Student Research

June 6, 2023January 28, 2019 by bdugan

On January 2nd, 2019, 39 graduate students from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Harvard Graduate School of Education will board planes and fly off to conduct unique research projects with ministries of health and education across Africa.

As part of its post-Harvard support, the Harvard Ministerial Leadership Program offers Program alumni the opportunity to present research proposals that can support the achievement of their legacy goals. The Program matches each proposal to a set of talented Harvard graduate students, and together with support from Professors Rifat Atun and Fernando Reimers, the students are well equipped to conduct rigorous research that can drive policy decisions.

Harvard Ministers Work on Innovative Ideas for Youth Development

June 6, 2023January 28, 2019 by bdugan

Over three days in late November about 25 currently serving government Ministers from across Africa gathered in Johannesburg, together with a similar number of selected young African achievers, to jointly develop new approaches to current high-levels of youth unemployment across Africa and to explore possibilities for optimizing the prospects of a demographic dividend.

Ministers, including finance, economic planning, education, health and youth had all participated in Ministerial Forums at Harvard over the past three years and continue to benefit from the post-Harvard support that is a key part of the Harvard Ministerial Leadership Program.

The Harvard Ministerial Roundtable for Policy Innovation in Human Capital Development in Johannesburg extended the on-going peer-networking among ministers participating in the Harvard Ministerial Leadership Program to include for the first time a cross-section of young African achievers from diverse backgrounds in discussions about optimizing Africa’s human capital.

Call for Student Rapporteurs – Powering Up: Ministerial Roundtable for Human Development Policy Innovation

June 6, 2023August 28, 2018 by bdugan

The Harvard Ministerial Leadership Program is calling for applications of Harvard graduate students to contribute substantively to Powering Up: A Ministerial Roundtable for Human Development Policy Innovation to be held in Johannesburg, South Africa toward the end of November 2018.

Be ‘Remarkable’ Kenyan First Lady Exhorts Harvard Forum Participants

June 6, 2023June 30, 2018 by bdugan

Speaking to participants in the seventh annual Harvard Ministerial Leadership Forum in early June, Margaret Kenyatta, First Lady of Kenya, outlined the impressive results of her groundbreaking Beyond Zero campaign: In Kenya, over the past five years, infant mortality has fallen from 52 per 1,000 to 39 per 1,000 live births; under five mortality came down from 74 per 1,000 to 52 per 1,000. Maternal mortality dropped from 488 per 100,000 to 362 per 1,000.

Prioritizing Budgets for Social Impact

June 6, 2023May 3, 2018 by bdugan

Finance and economic development ministers from nations in Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia recently gathered at Harvard for the annual Harvard Ministerial Leadership Forum, an intensive four-day program focused on ways that they can use their positions to accomplish policy and investment goals in human development. This year’s program featured a talk moderated by … Read more

From Classroom to Country: Harvard Students Working with Health and Education Ministers

June 6, 2023March 21, 2018 by bdugan

Last January, Marisa Steinmetz and Allison Casey, two students from the Harvard Graduate School of Education landed in the Republic of Madagascar with a mission from the Ministry of Education: to understand teacher absenteeism and identify possible solutions to this problem.

The ‘D-Team’: Cape Verde’s Use of Leadership to Drive Health Reform

June 6, 2023March 21, 2018 by bdugan

Following the participation of both the Health and Finance Ministers in the Harvard Ministerial Forums, Cape Verde Ministers mandated a team of top health and finance officials dubbed the ‘D-team’ to work with the Ministerial Program to strengthen health service delivery and increase budget effectiveness.

Celebrated Reproductive Health Expert Joins Advisory Board

June 6, 2023March 3, 2018 by bdugan

Dr. Senait Fisseha, MD, JD, Director of International Programs for the Susan Thompson Buffet Foundation and Clinical Professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology at the University of Michigan Medical School, has been appointed to the Advisory Board of the Harvard Ministerial Leadership Program. As the founding executive director of the University of Michigan’s Center for International Reproductive Health Training, Dr. Fisseha has spent her career leading groundbreaking research and training programs to improve reproductive health care in Ethiopia.

Harvard’s Follow-Up Support in Uganda Leads Increases Fiscal Space for Health

June 6, 2023March 3, 2018 by bdugan

Following participation in the Harvard Ministerial Leadership Forums by Uganda’s Ministers of Finance and Health, a Follow-up team of senior health and finance ministry officials began work with the Ministerial Program and its partners. A key focus of this work was the need to reallocate existing budget to priority health areas such as primary health care and capture fiscal space to increase available health funding. By June 2016, the inter-ministerial team had created fiscal space in the health budget to the value of over $22 million for a range of actions designed to strengthen health worker productivity, procurement and supply chain management with the goal of improving the standard of care in frontline health facilities.