The President of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in New York, Dr Elizabeth Alexander and the Chief of Staff and Programme Advisor at the Foundation, Ms. Julie B. Ehrlich paid a courtesy call on the Vice Chancellor of Makerere University, Prof. Barnabas Nawangwe on Friday, 21st February 2020. They also held a meeting with the Steering Committee of the 
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation projects at the College of Humanities and Social Sciences
(CHUSS). The Steering Committee comprises of the Principal, Dr Josephine Ahikire, and the Deans of the five Schools of the College namely; Dr Sarah Ssali, Dean School of Women and Gender Studies; Dr Andrew Ellias State, Dean School of Social Sciences, Dr Patrick Mangeni, Dean School of Liberal and Performing Arts; Dr Aaron Mushengyezi, Dean School of Languages, Literature and Communication and Dr Grace Kibanja, Dean School of Psychology.
During the meeting, Dr Ahikire informed the President that the funding from the Foundation came at a critical time when some disciplines in the Humanities and Social Sciences needed rejuvenation. “The funding has enabled us to build capacity of staff and students in the College. It has also presented an opportunity to young scholars to conduct research in the areas of their interest.
In her remarks, Dr Alexander who was pleased to meet the Steering Committee said the views shared would greatly enrich the Foundation’s programmes.
About the Mak-Andrew W. Mellon Foundation collaboration
In 2017, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation established formal collaboration with Makerere University and committed to support teaching, learning and research activities in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences to a tune of four million US dollars for a period of five years.
Since then, the Foundation has been supporting various learning and research projects in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHUSS) as indicated below.
- 1.5 million USD given to Makerere Institute of Social Research (MISR) for research on decolonization (Decolonization Project)
- Early Career Scholars Research grant worth 800,000 USD
- Building capacity for research grant worth 800,000 USD
- 800,000 US dollars for a College-wide research project titled: Historicizing the Humanities at Makerere University Since 1922. The Project seeks to rethink the research and scholarship enterprise of the humanities and humanistic social sciences at Makerere University.
- The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation continues to support PhD training and other academic programmes like the Annual CHUSS Symposium
- The Foundation also gave the College a planning grant worth 100,000 USD to study the operations of centres of learning and teaching across the globe in a bid to establish one at Makerere University. Once established, the Centre will largely address the teaching and learning challenges of academic staff. Staff will acquire skills on how best to train holistic students who can later have positive impact wherever they will be placed.
The projects are coordinated by Dr Edgar Nabutanyi and the Dr Levis Mugumya.
About the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
Established in 1969, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation endeavors to strengthen, promote, and, where necessary, defend the contributions of the humanities and the arts to human flourishing and to the well-being of diverse and democratic societies. To this end, it supports exemplary institutions of higher education and culture as they renew and provide access to an invaluable heritage of ambitious, path-breaking work. The Foundation makes grants in five core programme areas: Higher Education and Scholarship in the Humanities; Arts and Cultural Heritage; Diversity; Scholarly Communications; and International Higher Education and Strategic Projects.