This month marks the close of the ‘Leadership Immersion’ portion of programming of the fifth year and fourth cohort for the Evans School’s International Program in Public Health Leadership (IPPHL), an immersive, interactive, and powerful learning experience that will help transform the work of IPPHL fellows as they lead public health programs in their countries.
A flagship international development program of the Evans School, IPPHL expands the policy and leadership acumen of public health leaders throughout Africa to collectively transform health systems.
IPPHL recruits emerging leaders working within ministries of health across Africa, and expands their skills in policy, leadership, and management and implementation, so they can both design evidence-based policy and programs and drive their implementation. The 8-month program begins with a 10-week online introductory course to policy analysis and implementation. Fellows identify a specific challenge within their work and are paired with a faculty advisor who supports them in developing a policy memo and implementation plan. Pre-COVID, the fellows would then come to the University of Washington for a two-week residency. This year, that experience was transformed into three long weekends of immersive online learning and workshops.
At the end of the third and final weekend, fellows were energized, full of renewed commitment to their work and excited to try out new evidence-informed leadership strategies, support policy implementation and assessment, and build knowledge for decision-making in rapidly changing environments where no previous data exists.
As one fellow reflected, “I have not learnt only leadership theories and frameworks, but also how to be a true leader in the real sense by knowing myself as a person and how to work on myself to become that true and desirable public health leader.”
Fellows will now begin to implement their action plans. In September, the cohort will meet again for a virtual capstone to share their successes, roadblocks faced, lessons learned in implementation, and discuss what comes next as alumni as they graduate the program.
The International Program in Public Health Leadership is sponsored by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and works in partnership with the Center for Creative Leadership. To learn more about our collaborators and how to work with us, email us at ipphl@uw.edu