The second edition of the DIGITAfrica Summer School on Digital Sciences and Research Infrastructures brought together students from seven Senegalese higher education and research institutions to learn, experiment with emerging technologies and collaborate on solutions to national challenges. The programme was organised through a collaboration between UNESCO Campus Africa, Thiès Polytechnic School (EPT), the Network of Public Engineering Training Institutions in Senegal (REPFIS), the Senegalese Association of Computer Science Researchers (ASCII) and the DIGITAfrica project, that brings together a consortium of partners, including Cheikh Anta Diop University of Dakar (UCAD), in Senegal.
The training responded to challenges identified by studies conducted under DIGITAfrica across five African countries (Tunisia, Senegal, South Africa, Kenya, and Cameroon). These include limited access to reliable connectivity, lack of computing resources, practical training opportunities and sustainable technical support. Professor Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba Gueye of UCAD highlighted the particular importance of this work in Senegal, where nearly half the population is under 25, creating a strong need for scalable training and inclusive digital services.
During the first two days of the Summer School, participants set up a complete 5G infrastructure and tested its performance. They then formed multidisciplinary teams for an Urban Digital Services Hackathon, developing and deploying AI-enabled services using cloud-native infrastructure and a real-world 5G network. These activities gave them practical experience in telecommunications, data analytics, cloud automation and digital service development.
For Professor Gueye, who led the organization of the Summer School, the goal is to build lasting connections among researchers and innovators, beyond a single training event.
The ambition is to move beyond isolated training activities towards a sustainable community of researchers, engineers, and innovators capable of sharing resources, conducting reproducible experiments, and developing solutions to African societal challenges.
Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba GueyeProfessor, UCAD
The Summer School also aims to encourage collaboration across institutions and help participants apply their learning in their universities, laboratories and future work. Supported by UNESCO, it forms part of DIGITAfrica’s wider efforts to strengthen digital research and innovation capacity in Africa and contribute to a Pan-African Digital Sciences Research Infrastructure.
