Celebrating Our Center's Impact
Director's Note
The 2025-2026 academic year brought both challenges and opportunities for the Center for African Studies at Howard. The year began with a significantly altered federal funding landscape and the untimely loss of our beloved inaugural Director, Professor Mbye Cham. Despite significant hurdles and challenges, the Center implemented robust and far-reaching programming that reaffirmed the value and strength of its mission and community of faculty, students and partners.
Our Outreach Program continued the essential work of teaching K-12 educators to better understand the complex and dynamic countries of Africa. Our signature programs such as the Children’s Africana Book Awards, our Gold Road Interactive Map, and our Bouctou magazine continued to anchor our activities. We continued to reach a wide audience of teachers nationally through collaborations including with the Africa America Institute on the State of Education on Africa Conference which showcased our Gold Road curriculum.
Student and faculty success remained a priority despite cuts in federal funding and the absence of FLAS fellowships. With an affiliated faulty of over 150, Center support will allow HU faculty to introduce new courses on AI and African Studies and supported workshops for faculty and students on AI, Data and Africa; AI, Data and the New Economy of War in Africa. The Center has spearheaded a number of transregional initiatives around Africa, Latin America and Asia, including an Africa-China student lab and co-hosted the Latin America and Africa Forum on China. In 2026 we also became the new secretariat for the International Model African Union which facilitates diplomatic and foreign service training for undergraduate delegates from over 20 universities.
Student demand and Howard’s course enrollment in African languages and African Studies remains strong, surpassing any other university in the United States. We continue to support meaningful, immersive study abroad opportunities for Howard students, and are supporting 25 students who will be studying in Kenya, Ghana and South Africa this summer.
In lieu of an annual report, we have prepared a Series of Impact Snapshots that highlight key metrics and outputs of the Center over the past ten years. Of course much of the impact of our work, it’s real value, cannot be captured by the numbers. It lies in the connections that are made and in the unique ecosystem for Africa research, teaching and outreach we have cultivated. We encourage you to like and share our snapshots on social media and help us spread the word of good work we’ve been doing.
I and the staff at the Center thank the Howard community for its continued support and collaboration. We hope everyone has a restful and enjoyable summer.
Professor Krista Johnson, Director
Center for African Studies
Howard University
