Deadline: October 15, 2025
Applications are open for the AREF Excell Malaria Researcher & Leadership Development Programme 2026-2028. AREF’s mission is to support a community of health researchers across Africa in cultivating their knowledge and skills to become research leaders who can tackle African and global health challenges. For the Africa Research Excellence Fund (AREF) Excell programme, they will provide capacity building needed to equip African post-doctoral malaria researchers with the research leadership skills they need to progress and lead malaria research throughout their careers.
AREF’s Excell malaria programme will enable 18 individual researchers from three participating institutions to build strong research careers, empower excellent teams, win research funds, work collaboratively, engage with research users – and so make an even bigger impact on improving health and saving lives. They will support partner institutions to embed structural changes that will enhance their long-term ability to support emerging health research leaders, with up to $50,000 USD over two years available to support proposed capacity-building projects.
Programme Outline
In the two years from January 2026 to January 2028, the programme will include:
- Opening and closing conferences
- Project funding up to $50,000 USD to embed policy and practice
- Three experiential workshops
- Coaching and mentorship for institutional leads
- Supplementary webinars and on-line resources
- Monitoring and Evaluation of projects to include baseline and end-of-programme assessments
- Collaborative projects and networking
Eligibility
- Applicant should be an employee of an African institution with a significant and specific role in Malaria research.
- A national of an African state.
- 2-8 full years of active post-PhD research experience; or a clinician without a PhD with both an MD and research master’s and 4-8 years of active research experience.
- Not already having participated in previous Excell programme.
- AREF is keen to recruit talented researchers focusing on malaria research from a broad range of approaches, including laboratory, clinical, behavioural, social, public health, health systems, and environmental and mathematical sciences. Their research must be directed towards achieving better health outcomes in Africa and show alignment with their national Malaria research strategy, where applicable.
Application
Each application will be led by an Institutional Lead (IL), who will ideally be a mid to senior level malaria researcher. Within the institution, the IL will coordinate the competitive selection of five talented early career malaria researchers (the nominees) to participate in the AREF Excell malaria programme. It is estimated that the entire application process, including the competitive nomination of ECRs, will take about 6 to 8 weeks. Therefore, interested applicants are encouraged to start the process early.
For more information, visit AREF Excell Malaria Programme.
