Kindergarten all over again…

is how it feels to enter the halls of academia once again. I and 16 other students started the PhD journey the end of August. I soon discovered I have a great cohort. All together there are 12 of us studying African politics. I would venture to guess that this is the largest amount of any school in the world. The University of Florida has a strong African Studies Center and three faculty devoted specifically to African politics. On Friday afternoons the center sponsors a lecture series. These were always informative and a chance to meet other scholars with interests in Africa.