Kibabii University has been selected as Kenya’s partner institution in the prestigious Africa AI Upskilling Project, a transformative initiative aimed at strengthening Artificial Intelligence (AI) education and building a future-ready workforce across Africa. This follows a successful grant application led by Prof. Muganda Munir Manini, the Principal Investigator.
The Africa AI Upskilling Project is a multi-country initiative supported by Google Inc. and implemented through a collaboration between FATE Foundation and the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS). The programme brings together institutions from Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, and South Africa with the goal of developing a sustainable and scalable ecosystem for advanced AI training in higher education institutions.
Under the grant agreement running from 2026 to 2029, Kibabii University will receive US$57,333.33 to support the implementation of AI capacity-building activities targeting lecturers, teaching assistants, and STEM students. The University will participate in a Train-the-Trainer model where selected lecturers, referred to as AI Champions, and Teaching Assistants will be trained on the Google DeepMind AI Research Foundations Curriculum. The trained team will subsequently transfer AI knowledge and skills to penultimate and final-year STEM students, enabling them to develop innovative AI-powered capstone projects that address real-life challenges.
The broader objective of the programme is to contribute to the development of a pipeline of 1,100 AI-skilled graduates across participating institutions while promoting the use of artificial intelligence to drive innovation and solve societal and industry challenges.
The project will enhance the capacity of Kibabii University’s STEM departments by embedding practical, industry-aligned AI content into teaching and learning. It will also strengthen the ability of lecturers and teaching assistants to deliver advanced AI education through hands-on training in curriculum development, effective pedagogy, and modern teaching approaches.
Prof. Muganda Munir Manini will lead the Kibabii University implementation team comprising experts drawn from different academic disciplines. The team includes Dr. Sam Barasa, who will serve as Co-Principal Investigator and AI Champion, alongside Dr. Martha Konje, Dr. Roselinda Maroko Ongare, Dr. Yonah Etene, and Dr. Patrick Owoche, who will serve as AI Champions and team members. The team will also include Mr. Peter Wawire Barasa as the Lead Teaching Assistant, together with Prof. Julius Maiyo and Dr. Echaune Manasi as team members.