IRES: Collaborative Research: Student-Scout Partnership for Exploring Sustainable Transitions of Kenyan Drylands

This IRES project addresses the significant socio-environmental changes affecting dryland systems in Kenya, including arid, semiarid, and dry sub-humid areas, through the formation of a student-scout partnership to understand and promote sustainable and fair transitions in these socio-environmental systems. Selected undergraduate students undergo extensive preparation, including learning Swahili and studying dryland system sustainability and research methods. Each cohort of U.S. undergraduates spend eight weeks in Kenya conducting field research, using various methods such as GPS-tracking livestock, plant surveys, wildlife censuses, household surveys, and interviews. This research contributes to important findings in dryland sustainability while training a diverse group of future STEM professionals. This project investigates the sustainability of dryland systems by focusing on the essential role of mobility in connecting social and environmental components. It aims to understand pastoralists’ livelihood strategies and resource access and examines how to balance agricultural intensification with mobile herding. Methods include tracking livestock movements and assessing rangeland vegetation dynamics, which provide insights into rangeland governance that support dryland system resilience. The project is interdisciplinary, aligning with NSF’s goals to encourage convergence research and leverage data to understand system transitions and tipping points. Collaboration involves Cornell, Michigan, and Princeton, with mentorship and local support from long-term collaborators in Kenya. This project advances the scientific understanding of dryland sustainability and contributes significantly to training a new generation of U.S. researchers capable of addressing global sustainability challenges. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.