Humanitarian OSM Team/Open Mapping Hub West and Northern Africa/Community/Fellowship

Context

The West and North Africa region is composed of 24 countries, at various levels of development of their OpenStreetMap (OSM) communities. We have first the countries where there is no reported presence of communities, those where there is a little organized community, and finally the countries where the community is structured around a representative organization. Where organizations exist, they carry the objective of contributing to the growth of OSM mappers by providing a supportive environment. They therefore organize, together with local or international partners, training or mapping activities, in order to increase the number of contributors or to improve the map of the country. The dynamism of the communities in the region has provided a pool of qualified people for whom the local contribution needs to be scaled up from a voluntary and carefree contribution to a full exploitation of the map data for development. For this, it is important to improve the use cases, and especially their documentation, in order to enable the establishment of advocacy and evidence-based awareness. As part of its program to support the development of OSM communities in the region, the West and Central Africa hub is planning to set up a scholarship program for students. This scholarship aims to test and document the uses of OSM in several scenarios.

Objective

The main objective of this program is to generate knowledge on the added value of using OpenStreetMap for improved decision making in West and North African countries. Specifically, this will involve:

• Raise the interest of the research community in OSM;
• Develop collaborations between the research community and OSM contributors;
• Produce research on the use of OSM in local decision-making processes;
• Test uses of OSM that can be scaled up for the region in the thematic areas of interest;
• Improve communication about OSM.

Expected results

At the conclusion of this fellowship program, it is expected that;

• A dozen students from 10 countries have conducted research on OSM;
• Research reports are produced on the use of OSM in topics of interest to HOT;
• Partnerships are developed with researchers in the 10 countries;
• The OSM community has grown in the target countries.

Target audience

This program targets students in geography, geomatics, geographic information systems, Environmental Science, Climate change or sociology, at the end of their Master 2 year in public or private universities in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Togo.

Thematic

The themes covered by this fellowship program are: Public Health, Climate Change, Sustainable Cities, Gender, Displacement and Migration.

Eligibility Criteria

To be eligible for this program, you must:

• Be enrolled in a university in one of the countries listed above;
• Reside in the country concerned, during the period of the scholarship;
• Be at the end of the Master 2 year;
• Need to complete an internship to validate their academic year;
• Have a letter of recommendation from a teacher;
• Having already found an organization in which to conduct the internship will be an asset;
• The research topic concerns one of the hub's themes;

Implementation process

The fellowship is aimed at students who want to use OpenStreetMap to support the implementation of development programs, or humanitarian interventions in themes of interest to the hub. This includes demonstrating the added value of participatory mapping approaches, leveraging the quality of the data for different types of uses, or the added value of the community-based approach of OpenStreetMap.

• Opening of the applications : December 19 2022
• Applications closes : January 02 2023 January 16 2023

Application form