MENTEE SPOTLIGHT: RACHEL ZAKAYO

Meet Rachel  

My name is Rachel Zakayo from Tanzania. I am a PhD candidate from Sokoine University of agriculture pursuing PhD agriculture and rural innovation. My research area is adaptation to climate variability and gender among paddy farmers in Tanzania. My other research interest is Gender since I want to know how gender is integrated in climate change agender. 

ISNAD-Africa MRP and Being a Mentee. 

Before becoming one of the mentees at ISNAD-Africa, I was working hard to search for a scholarship for almost 5 years without getting a single one. One day I was trying to search for scholarships online, when I came across ISNAD-Africa. I didn’t know what the organisation was about, but I decided to dig deeper and to figure out what they are about. 

After reading through, I decided to send in my application. I said to myself “let me send it in, they might not reply anyways”. After a few weeks, I was shocked to see that I was selected to become a mentee. I was so glad to have received been selected, after many rejections prior to this.  

I later received an email with further instructions for onboarding, including attending three Webinars. I attended all webinars, which enlightened me to a great extent. I also submitted information about my research interest and abstract, and I was paired with a mentor in the Mentorship for Research Programme. Soon after, I began my mentee journey.   

The Journey  

I was very happy when I started the mentee journey at ISNAD-Africa. My mentor is very experienced in the area of my research interest. Many thanks go to ISNAD-Africa who did an incredible job at the matching of mentees and mentors. Sincerely the journey has been an exciting one for me because my mentor is very cooperative. He went over and beyond in helping with my research- playing a parental role as well. I found him very resourceful and very friendly to ask for advice- always coming up with new and important ideas to enhance my research. 

Many thanks to my mentor and ISNAD-Africa for offering us the opportunity to mould our research as well as networking with experts from different regions.