LeAP improves wildlife conservation in Africa’s protected and conserved areas by strengthening training at African wildlife colleges and universities. We enhance faculty expertise so that they can embed conservation leadership into undergraduate curricula for park managers, conservation area specialists, and wildlife practitioners. Graduates gain key professional skills not typically taught – such as team building, problem-solving, conflict management, and community engagement – enabling them to manage protected areas more effectively.
The result is healthier wildlife populations and habitats, thriving communities, and stronger local economies.
For millennia, Africa’s diverse landscapes have supported abundant populations of iconic wildlife found nowhere else on Earth. Today, many of those populations are in trouble. Habitat loss, wildlife trafficking, and drought caused by climate change are just a few of the modern challenges wildlife – and the people working to conserve them – face. In a rapidly changing world with a growing human population, new threats to wildlife, and the communities that live with them, continually emerge. To meet global goals to protect 30% of the planet by 2030 (30×30), conservation leaders need cutting edge professional skills to adapt to changing conditions and work with local communities to find solutions.
By expanding the LeAP Faculty Network across countries throughout Africa, LeAP reaches hundreds of graduates and ensures that all rangers and managers will gain the leadership skills they need to conserve wildlife and wild landscapes in conjunction with local communities long into the future.
LeAP has launched with four co-founding academic institutions in Central and West Africa. These wildlife colleges and universities helped craft the Mission and Vision and guide our programs through monthly meetings and regular input. Over time, the LeAP Network of African wildlife universities will grow.
To establish a network among African wildlife colleges and universities to enhance their faculty’s expertise and transform students into conservation leaders that effectively manage protected areas, conserve wildlife, address high-priority threats, and foster strategic partnerships with stakeholders to better conserve iconic wildlife and parks.
We envision an Africa with abundant wildlife and world-class parks managed by transformative African conservation leaders trained at outstanding African government colleges and universities to address threats to wildlife in ways that benefit Africa and the global community.
More African colleges and universities will be invited to join the network in the future, and new coursework added as LeAP leaps higher to train more African protected and conserved area staff on cutting edge skills and tools, including:
conservation leadership
teamwork
problem solving
conflict management
programs for women
new technologies
If your institution would like to become part of the LeAP Network, please reach out to us below!
