Southern Africa Consortium for Research Excellence (SACORE): successes and challenges

www.thelancet.com/lancetgh Vol 2 December 2014 A key achievement of SACORE has been the establishment of research support centres in the three lowincome partner institutions. These act as one-stop service centres through which various researchrelated activities are coordinated and facilitated. They provide comprehensive research support services, including pre-award and post-award management of grants, to faculty and students, irrespective of funder. When SACORE was launched, the research support centre in Malawi was already fully operational, having been established in 2006 with support from the Netherlands–African partnership for capacity development and clinical interventions of poverty-related diseases (NACCAP). In Zimbabwe, the research support centre was established in 2011, and has since leveraged additional funding to construct offices and teaching facilities. The centre in Zambia was established in 2011 and funded through SACORE. It consists of offi ces for research administration and lecturing facilities. All three centres are fully operational, and serve as a model for other institutions in the region (eg, Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, and the University of Rwanda in Butare, Rwanda). To build, support, and retain a critical mass of quality researchers at the low-income partner institutions, SACORE members realised that the existing faculty and fellows needed to be supported, not only in terms of their own professional development, but also to build career pathways for aspiring researchers. A professional development committee was established to determine the training needs of faculty and fellows. A situational analysis was done and a consortium-wide professional development plan was developed, which provided a framework for professional development training, focusing on providing faculty with the skills to support fellows to off ered small grants of £5000 to junior faculty and postgraduate researchers, which provided seed funding for locally relevant research to generate preliminary data in support of grant applications. Second, the consortium provided travel fellowships of up to £2000 to allow SACORE fellows, administrators, and faculty to attend courses and conferences. Third, SACORE competitively awarded MPhil and PhD fellowships to enable fellows at low-income partner institutions to undertake research in a subject area of their choosing. 11 Masters and 18 PhD fellows were recruited through a rigorous process; all fellowships were approved by the SACORE fellowship committee. By August, 2014, three scholars had graduated and connected with future collaborators. At least 20 articles have been published in peer-reviewed journals with SACORE fellows as co-authors. The fourth area of activity, recruitment of postdoctoral fellows, has been more challenging, largely because of a paucity of eligible applicants and inadequate institutional frameworks (unpublished data). Few appropriately experienced supervisors or mentors were available at low-income partner institutions, particularly for some areas of study. In response, we constructed triangular supervisory networks with local, regional, and UK-based advisers. For some fellows, this system worked well, with complementary advice from different senior academics. It worked less well for some others, either because of diffi culty engaging the UK or regional expert, or because scholars were reluctant to reach out to people they had never met. The SACORE Annual Scientifi c Meeting was intended as a forum where scholars and advisers would meet, but advisers were often unable to attend. Thematic workshops (eg, in parasitology and pharmacology) at the annual meeting enhanced supervision and direction, and this approach could be extended in the future. Southern Africa Consortium for Research Excellence (SACORE): successes and challenges

A key achievement of SACORE has been the establishment of research support centres in the three lowincome partner institutions. These act as one-stop service centres through which various researchrelated activities are coordinated and facilitated. 7,8 They provide comprehensive research support services, including pre-award and post-award management of grants, to faculty and students, irrespective of funder.
When SACORE was launched, the research support centre in Malawi was already fully operational, having been established in 2006 with support from the Netherlands-African partnership for capacity development and clinical interventions of poverty-related diseases (NACCAP). 8 In Zimbabwe, the research support centre was established in 2011, and has since leveraged additional funding to construct offices and teaching facilities. The centre in Zambia was established in 2011 and funded through SACORE. It consists of offi ces for research administration and lecturing facilities. All three centres are fully operational, and serve as a model for other institutions in the region (eg, Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, and the University of Rwanda in Butare, Rwanda).
To build, support, and retain a critical mass of quality researchers at the low-income partner institutions, SACORE members realised that the existing faculty and fellows needed to be supported, not only in terms of their own professional development, but also to build career pathways for aspiring researchers. A professional development committee was established to determine the training needs of faculty and fellows. A situational analysis was done and a consortium-wide professional development plan was developed, which provided a framework for professional development training, focusing on providing faculty with the skills to support fellows to off ered small grants of £5000 to junior faculty and postgraduate researchers, which provided seed funding for locally relevant research to generate preliminary data in support of grant applications. Second, the consortium provided travel fellowships of up to £2000 to allow SACORE fellows, administrators, and faculty to attend courses and conferences. Third, SACORE competitively awarded MPhil and PhD fellowships to enable fellows at low-income partner institutions to undertake research in a subject area of their choosing. 11 Masters and 18 PhD fellows were recruited through a rigorous process; all fellowships were approved by the SACORE fellowship committee. By August, 2014, three scholars had graduated and connected with future collaborators. At least 20 articles have been published in peer-reviewed journals with SACORE fellows as co-authors. The fourth area of activity, recruitment of postdoctoral fellows, has been more challenging, largely because of a paucity of eligible applicants and inadequate institutional frameworks (unpublished data).
Few appropriately experienced supervisors or mentors were available at low-income partner institutions, particularly for some areas of study. In response, we constructed triangular supervisory networks with local, regional, and UK-based advisers. For some fellows, this system worked well, with complementary advice from different senior academics. It worked less well for some others, either because of diffi culty engaging the UK or regional expert, or because scholars were reluctant to reach out to people they had never met. The SACORE Annual Scientifi c Meeting was intended as a forum where scholars and advisers would meet, but advisers were often unable to attend. Thematic workshops (eg, in parasitology and pharmacology) at the annual meeting enhanced supervision and direction, and this approach could be extended in the future.

Southern Africa Consortium for Research Excellence (SACORE): successes and challenges
Most universities and research institutions in sub-Saharan Africa are limited by inadequate resources and research expertise. The few appropriately qualified academics have a large teaching workload (in addition to a clinical workload in the case of clinicians). 1,2 Additionally, young researchers who take up training opportunities overseas rarely return home because of a scarcity of career opportunities and incentives. 3 design, implement, analyse, and write up their work. Faculty at all sites received training in supervision, mentoring, and scientific writing. Additionally, SACORE provided highlevel academic leadership training to senior academics, providing opportunities for shared problem solving and learning.
SACORE has provided a unique platform for new South-South partnerships, collaborations, and networking. Collaborative activities led by middle-income partner institutions have included cohosting of selected PhD fellows when specialist training was not available at the host low-income partner institution; mentorship and supervision; and the training of fellows in the writing of research proposals, biostatistics, and laboratory skills. The SACORE Annual Scientific Meeting provides a forum for scientists at all stages of their careers to present their research and network with each other. A cross-consortium team visited all low-income partner institutions to assess progress towards consortium aims and provide technical guidance. Increasing numbers of opportunities for South-South collaborative research grant submissions and exchange of scholars and teaching faculty are planned to strengthen these South-to-South partnerships.
At the University of Malawi College of Medicine (Blantyre, Malawi) and University of Zambia School of Medicine (Lusaka, Zambia), SACORE is no longer regarded as a standalone project, but as integral to the institutions. The University of Zimbabwe College of Health Sciences (Harare, Zimbabwe) leveraged funding from NACCAP to engage a biostatistician to provide individualised support with proposal design and statistical analysis. In the future, the research support centres could be sustained financially with funds collected as research overheads, as is the case at most universities in the USA and Europe.
There is substantial interest in developing research capacity in Africa from various institutions in the global North and South. Failing to do so could result in much of global health research being driven by the North rather than the South, thereby perpetuating the often unequal North-South research partnerships of previous years. We believe that SACORE's experiences will be of interest to academics and practitioners committed to the development of global health as a scientifi c discipline.
We declare no competing interests. We acknowledge support from the Wellcome Trust