People Directory

Our team is the heartbeat of our collaborative efforts, comprising diverse experts from various fields. Each member brings unique skills and perspectives, uniting to drive innovation and impact in the health sector. Together, we are more than just a team; we are a community committed to transforming healthcare across Africa.

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People Directory

Photo of Gwen Burrows

Assistant Vice-President, International Engagement & Impact

University of Toronto, Office of the Vice-President International

Photo of Dr. Yeukai Mlambo

, PhD

Interim Director of Special Programs Collaboratives

Mastercard Foundation

Photo of Dawit Wondimagegn Gebreamlak

, MD

Associate Professor, Addis Ababa University Consultant Psychiatrist, Tikur Anbessa Hospital Associate professor, Addis Ababa University, Co-chair and Director, Toronto Addis Ababa Academic Collaboration-TAAAC National Lead, African Health Observatory Platform- Ethiopia National Centre

Addis Ababa University

Photo of Patrick Kerre

, PhD

Dean, School of Public Health

Moi University

Photo of Penina Lam

, PhD

Senior Director, International Relations, Africa

University of Toronto

Photo of Wilfred Ndifon

, PhD

Professor, Theoretical Biology and Chief Scientific Officer at AIMS

African Institute for Mathematical Sciences

Photo of Joachim Osur

, PhD

Vice Chancellor, Amref International University

Amref International University

Photo of Angela Owusu-Ansah

, PhD

Provost (Chief Academic Officer/Pro Vice Chancellor) at Ashesi University

Ashesi University

Photo of Ellis Owusu-Dabo

, PhD

Pro Vice-Chancellor, Office of the Vice-Chancellor

Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology

Photo of David Palmer

Vice President, Advancement

University of Toronto

Profile

Gwen Burrows

Assistant Vice-President, International Engagement & Impact

University of Toronto

Gwen Burrows is Assistant Vice-President, International Engagement & Impact at the University of Toronto.

The Assistant Vice-President, International Engagement and Impact (AVP IEI) collaborates with colleagues across the university and internationally to advance the University of Toronto’s global excellence and impact in research, its translation, and in teaching and learning. The Assistant Vice-President leads and executes the University’s integrated international strategy across multiple dimensions, with a particular focus on region-specific engagement strategies and the development of partnerships to maximize global impact.

Gwen was Executive Director in the Office of the Vice President International for five years before becoming AVP IEI and in that role, supported the creation and implementation of the University’s first international strategic plan, and led the development of key international partnerships in a number of regions around the world. Gwen came to the University from The Hospital for Sick Children, where she held a number of leadership positions, including Executive Director, Public Affairs and Child Health Advocacy. As Director, Strategic Projects for the SickKids Research Institute from 2006-2013, amongst other accomplishments Gwen co-led a successful $227 million Canada Foundation for Innovation grant proposal and its implementation to support the vision guiding the development of the Peter Gilligan Centre for Research and Learning. Gwen holds a Master’s in Philosophy from Johns Hopkins and a BA from McGill University.

Email Address
gwen.burrows@utoronto.ca
Profile Type
Staff
Country
Canada
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Dr. Yeukai Mlambo , PhD

Interim Director of Special Programs Collaboratives

Mastercard Foundation

Dr. Yeukai Mlambo is the Interim Director of Special Programs Collaboratives at the Mastercard Foundation. In her role, she advances multi-stakeholder sectoral programs that leverage a consortia of higher education institutions working collaboratively to address pressing global challenges that impact African youth. Current Collaboratives focus on health, pandemic sciences and climate resilience and sustainability, aimed at strengthening the workforce, entrepreneurship, ecosystems, and knowledge activities and outcomes in and for Africa in these key sectors.  

Yeukai holds a master’s degree in research psychology from the University of Pretoria, and a PhD in Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education from Michigan State University. She has worked in the private sector, civil society, and higher education for 15 years where she advanced higher education development, faculty engagement and research, and partnerships for African development. Yeukai continues to publish on issues of higher education transformation, access, and leadership. Yeukai’s work spans multiple thematic areas including a focus on the recruitment, retention, and sustained success of women in higher education; faculty development in sub-Saharan Africa; international student experiences; global north-south higher education partnerships; and leveraging technology to support youth transitions into and beyond higher education. Drawing from her educational and professional experiences in both Africa and North America, Yeukai brings a strategic operational approach to her work to achieve impact.

Pillars
Health Employment
Health Entrepreneurship
Health Ecosystems
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Dawit Wondimagegn Gebreamlak, MD

Associate Professor, Addis Ababa University Consultant Psychiatrist, Tikur Anbessa Hospital Associate professor, Addis Ababa University, Co-chair and Director, Toronto Addis Ababa Academic Collaboration-TAAAC National Lead, African Health Observatory Platform- Ethiopia National Centre

Addis Ababa University

Dr. Dawit Wondimagegn is the former Chief Executive Director of the College of Health Sciences (CHS), Vice President of Addis Ababa University (AAU), Chair of AAU’s, Department of Psychiatry and Director of Graduate Programs for AAU, CHS in Ethiopia. Currently he is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at AAU, a Consultant Psychiatrist, Tikur Anbessa Hospital, Co-chair and Director, Toronto Addis Ababa Academic Collaboration-TAAAC and the National Lead, African Health Observatory Platform- Ethiopia National Centre.

Through his numerous activities as a clinical and health systems leader, global mental health expert, IPT expert, and researcher, he is helping to decrease stigma and improve access to mental healthcare. An Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at AAU, he co-leads with Marci Rose the Toronto Addis Ababa Academic Collaboration to develop post-graduate subspecialty training programs in numerous areas of medicine, primary care and nursing in Ethiopia.

He has published in the areas of global mental health, family medicine, medical ethics, psychotherapy knowledge translation, and post-partum depression. He was a primary investigator of two Grand Challenges Canada funded projects – The Biaber Project, to scale up screening and mental health care in Ethiopian primary care settings; and to engage with Ethiopian traditional healers, using a collaborative care model to increase the identification and treatment of psychiatric disorders. He has culturally adapted IPT for Ethiopia (IPT-E) and led IPT workshops for psychiatry residents at AAU and University of Toronto. The Biaber Project enabled the training of >500 Ethiopian primary care nurses in IPT-E.

Email Address
dawit.wondimagegn@aau.edu.et
Profile Type
Faculty
Country
Ethiopia
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Patrick Kerre, PhD

Dean, School of Public Health

Moi University

Email Address
kerrepatrick@gmail.com
Profile Type
Faculty
Country
Kenya
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Penina Lam, PhD

Senior Director, International Relations, Africa

University of Toronto

Dr. Penina Lam is the U of T’s Senior Director of International Relations, where she leads strategic engagement and development of partnerships with Africa.

 She also leads the implementation of the Africa Health Collaborative, designed to facilitate talent development and entrepreneurship among African youth. She oversees the Secretariat team and works in close partnership with colleagues across U of T, with African institutions, and the Mastercard Foundation. 

As a scholar-practitioner, she’s passionate about research and programs that foster access to and equity in education, health, and employment opportunities.  Prior to joining U of T, she worked as an Organizational Development (OD) consultant at the World Bank, in healthcare and education sectors. She’s experienced at engaging with diverse stakeholders to design, develop, and deliver impactful learning and talent development program.

Her academic career has spanned research, faculty, staff, and senior leadership roles working with African, Canadian, and US institutions. Dr. Lam holds a Ph.D. in Educational Leadership & OD, with a focus on Human Resource Development.

Email Address
penina.lam@utoronto.ca
Profile Type
Faculty
Country
Canada
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Wilfred Ndifon, PhD

Professor, Theoretical Biology and Chief Scientific Officer at AIMS

African Institute for Mathematical Sciences

Wilfred Ndifon is Professor of Theoretical Biology and the Chief Scientific Officer at AIMS, a Pan-African network of higher-education institutes dedicated to catalyzing Africa’s socio-economic transformation through advanced training and research in mathematical sciences.

He has made important contributions to a range of topics at the interface of mathematics and biology, including discovering a mechanism that allows flu viruses to escape from antibodies, with significant implications for the design of more effective flu vaccines; a physical mechanism that governs the generation of T-cell diversity via genetic recombination; and a unified mechanistic explanation for the age-old problem of the original antigenic sin. Recently, he led the development of a new mathematical approach to pooled testing, which has produced substantial testing-efficiency gains in field applications conducted in both Rwanda and South Africa. He took his PhD at Princeton.

Email Address
wndifon@nexteinstein.org
Profile Type
Faculty
Country
Rwanda
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Joachim Osur, PhD

Vice Chancellor, Amref International University

Amref International University

Joachim Osur is a Professor of Public Health as well as a Sexual and Reproductive Health practitioner. He is the Vice Chancellor, Amref International University.

He is a leader with wide experience in building sustainable health systems in Africa. He is also a specialist in higher education with a focus in building fit for purpose health workforce for African health systems. He is a medical practitioner specialized in Sexual Medicine and continues to attend to patients in his line of specialization.

Email Address
joachim.osur@amref.org
Profile Type
Faculty
Country
Kenya
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Angela Owusu-Ansah, PhD

Provost (Chief Academic Officer/Pro Vice Chancellor) at Ashesi University

Ashesi University

Angela Owusu-Ansah brings more than thirty years of academic and administrative experience in the United States and Ghana, West Africa, to her current role as Provost of Ashesi University. A member of the Phi Kappa Phi, a community of top scholars and professionals, she seeks to build an enduring legacy for future generations. She is a strong advocate for higher education quality serving on national university accreditation agency Boards such as the Ghana Tertiary Education Council (GTEC) and serving 18 years on the United States Council for Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP, formerly NCATE).

As an education leader, Angela served as Elon University’s Associate Dean of the School of
Education and Associate Dean of Access and Success, Samford University’s Assistant Dean of Education Assessment, and currently, Ashesi University’s Provost. She leverages innovative approaches, such as the scholarship of teaching and learning to improve student learning, the science of learning for faculty optimization of instruction, and research capacity building to improve higher education experiences and outcomes. She served on one of the ten Regional Education Laboratories’ Board in the United States to contribute to policy direction and implementation to support research in education.

Angela fosters entrepreneurial and innovative thinking for improving Africa by building spaces for students’ problem solving, integrating southern theory where feasible, and contributing to the development of Africa’s first university ranking system designed for appreciative inquiry of Africa’s systematic growth. Her research interest is in impact evaluation and change in Africa’s higher education, specifically digitized higher education instruction, higher education teaching and learning as a science, intercultural understanding among African students, and African women in Higher Education leadership.

Email Address
aowusuansah@ashesi.edu.gh
Profile Type
Faculty
Country
Ghana
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

Ellis Owusu-Dabo, PhD

Pro Vice-Chancellor, Office of the Vice-Chancellor

Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology

Dr. Ellis Owusu-Dabo is a Consultant Public Health Physician, Teacher and Researcher.

As a Professor of Epidemiology and Global Health, his area of expertise is in Medical Epidemiology and applied public health technologies. As a teacher, he has trained undergraduate and postgraduate 2 students, as well as mentored young faculty at both local and international levels.

Ellis is a demonstrable astute university administrator and a research project management consultant. He is highly driven in his research interest area, mainly non-communicable diseases in low-income country settings. He also has considerable interest in population genomics of pulmonary tuberculosis.

Ellis has secured and managed multimillion United States dollar research grants from principal granting institutions such as the European Union, National Institutes of Health (NIH), The World Bank and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) as well as many bilateral organisations. He serves on several boards at both local and international levels, and has a massive network of individuals and organisations he works with. Dr Owusu-Dabo has published over 250 research articles in peer-reviewed journals. As Perelman International Scholar of the University of Pensylvannia School of Medicine, his passion is in building capacities of next generation scientists and health systems to help solve Africa’s health problems through scientific research collaborations.

Email Address
owusudabo@yahoo.com
Profile Type
Faculty
Country
Ghana
Governance
Executive Steering Committee
Profile

David Palmer

Vice President, Advancement

University of Toronto

Since 2007, David has served as Vice-President, Advancement for the University of Toronto.  Under David’s leadership, U of T launched Boundless which concluded in 2018 as the largest campaign in Canadian history with $2.64 billion raised.   

David is a Senior Fellow of Massey College, a Council for Advancement and Support of Education Laureate and former trustee, an executive committee member of the National Council of Foundation Executives, and a director of the Earth Rangers Foundation. He earned his Master of Fine Arts in musicology from Princeton University and began his career as a Lecturer in the Faculty of Music at Western University, his undergraduate alma mater.

From 1999 to 2007, David served as President and Executive Director of the Royal Ontario Museum Board of Governors. From 1993 to 1999, David led a ground-breaking campaign for the Richard Ivey School of Business at Western University, ushering in a new era in professional-faculty fundraising in Canada.

David was recognized in 2011 with the Outstanding Fundraising Professional Award by the Association of Fundraising Professionals. In 2016 he was recognized with the Outstanding Achievement Award by the Canadian Council for the Advancement of Education.

Email Address
davidnpalmer@utoronto.ca
Profile Type
Staff
Country
Canada
Governance
Executive Steering Committee