Origin Labs Africa | Practical Field Lab

Deadline

Launched in January 2024, the Practical Field Lab (PFL) is an off-campus experiential learning curriculum where faculty and students engage in learning through problem-solving at the intersection of multiple systems of knowledge and practice.

The class is organized around a problem which local students are embarking on solving. Students will be placed into these projects to work under mixed teams of academic and non-academic instructors, with very clear matching of their skills and career goals to specific examinable practical deliverables.

The 2025 PFL builds upon a successful pilot composed of DeKUT and MIT students and faculty in January 2024. Entitled “Calabashing: Innovating with Gourds,” it focused on one organic material—the gourd, an icon of African culture as a lens into innovation.

The Practical Field Lab is designed to

Equip participants to translate academic knowledge into skills for turning problems into opportunities for interdisciplinary creativity and problem-solving
Create synergies between traditional African practices of science, technology, innovation and entrepreneurship.

Our focus is on building fish value chains, climate adaptation and mitigation, and rural industrialization.

Directors: Prof. Chakanetsa Mavhunga (MIT) and Prof. Ndirangu Kioni (DeKUT)

Host: Origin Labs, Dedan Kimathi University of Technology (DeKUT), Nyeri, Kenya

Dates: January 4^th-31st, 2025

Deadline for Applications: Nov 1^st, 2024

Notification by: Nov 15^th, 2024

Course Fee: $1750 (inc. tuition, admin, accommodation, food, and field transport) excludes airfare.

Program: Mon-Fri 8-4:30pm, Free Weekend

The Field Class

The Field Class is four weeks long in January and takes place in Nyeri, Kenya, and coincides with academic calendars across Africa and the world. Diverse teams of academic and non-academic instructors will guide students in hands-on learning through problem-solving at carefully scoped problem-sites. The class counts as 12 units or can be taken for no-credit because this is team-based hands-on work, all participating students are required to perform 42 hours of field-based work regardless of whether they are doing it for credit or not. This requirement cannot be varied. For 2025, the Field Class will only be offered in Nyeri (Kenya). From January 2026 onward, the Field Class will be conducted in Kenya, Zimbabwe, and Namibia between June 1st-August 31st. This Call for Applications is for the Field Class January 4th-31st 2025 only.

Internship Program

The Internship Program is 8-12 weeks long between June 1st and August 31st in Kenya, Zimbabwe, and Namibia. (Longer stays are possible on a case-by-case basis). The program is designed for vocational, technical, and polytechnic college and university students, as well as youth without formal qualifications but with proven and verifiable practical experience. The students will embed in the ongoing projects where they will be assigned specific responsibilities and performance assessment. The Call for Applications for this Internship Program will be announced in February 2025.

Featured Projects

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All 22
Field Class 13
Internship 09

🇿🇼 Design + implement grass and tree seedling projects for zero-grazing/thatching and reforstration and decarbonization

Climate Adaptation + Mitigation Internship July -August 🇿🇼 Zimbabwe

Call for Applications

Transformative Value Chains Development and Education

Deadline

1st November

Launched in January 2024, the Practical Field Lab (PFL) is an off-campus experiential learning curriculum where faculty and students engage in learning through problem-solving at the intersection of multiple systems of knowledge and practice.

Tracks

The Field Class

Internship Program

Featured Projects

🇿🇼 Design + implement grass and tree seedling projects for zero-grazing/thatching and reforstration and decarbonization

🇰🇪 Design + build auxiliary system for cooling a trout fish hatchery unit, for water recirculation, and cleaning

🇰🇪 Make a low-cost fish feed machine

🇰🇪 Design + build modernised Indigenous buildings using wooden poles, grass, and selected soils

🇰🇪 Making + installing an automated fish feeding mechanism to control fish overfeeding and underfeeding

🇰🇪 Design a business model for and launch a venture that makes food processing and musical equipment from gourds

🇿🇼 Design a business model for and launch a carpentry + welding venture that designs and makes beehives, box-bailers, chick- and fish-cages, and other farm essentials

🇰🇪 Develop + deploy IoT device to measure and subsequently enable control or intervention of pond water parameters

🇿🇼 Venture to train, supply, + manage staff to run projects and maintain homes of diaspora-based citizens

Design + develop auxiliary systems for large-scale water recirculation and cleaning in fish rearing ponds

🇿🇼 Design a business model for and launch cooking oil venture, targeting locally produced ground nuts and sunflower

Design a business model for and launch a venture that makes low-cost machine tools for dredging silt and sand to rehabilitate rivers.

🇿🇼 Design a business model for and launch a venture that makes low-cost machine-tools for dredging silt and sand to rehabilitate rivers

🇰🇪 Establishment of a hatchery for the African lungfish and other indigenous fish to enable its introduction in commercial aquaculture and repopulation

🇰🇪 Design + develop shoe sole molding machine

🇰🇪 Design and deploy devices to deter monkeys from invading farms bordering conservancies

🇰🇪 Design + build fish rearing pond with a greenhouse cover

🇿🇼 Design + Fabricate Molds for Making Concrete Fencing Posts as an Antidote Against Fencing Induced Deforestation

🇰🇪 Design + develop auxiliary systems for large-scale water recirculation and cleaning in fish rearing ponds

🇿🇼 Design a business model for and launch the animal feeds and organic fertilizer pelletizing venture, targeting local crops and farm waste

🇰🇪 Research, develop, and implement solution to the Golden Apple Snail which decimate rice seedlings, forming farmers to replant

🇳🇦 🇿🇼 Establishment of aquaponics (integrated multitrophic aquaculture) as a sustainable food production system in desert/drought-prone environments

Apply now for the 2025 Practical Field Lab.